A Dictionary of Music and Musicians/Thibaut, Anton
THIBAUT, Anton Friedrich Justus, born Jan. 4, 1772, at Hameln on the Weser, studied law at Göttingen, became tutor at Königsberg, and law-professor at the University of Kiel, then at Jena, and in 1805 at Heidelberg, where he remained till his death, March 25, 1840. The Archduke of Baden made him Geheimrath. He was an ardent admirer of the old Italian church-composers, especially of Palestrina, and founded a society for the practice of such music at his own house.[1] The performances took place before a select circle of invited guests, and were distinguished for their variety, Thibaut placing at their disposal the whole of his valuable and scarce collection of music. After his death Heidelberg no longer took the same interest in the Palestrina school, but in the meantime a large proportion of the professors and amateurs of Germany had become familiarised with one of the noblest and most elevating branches of the art. Mendelssohn for instance writes with the greatest enthusiasm about Thibaut, 'There is but one Thibaut,' he says, 'but he is as good as half a dozen. He is a man.' Again, in a letter to his mother from Heidelberg, dated Sept. 20, 1827, is the following characteristic passage. 'It is very singular, the man knows little of music, not much even of the history of it, he goes almost entirely by instinct; I know more about it than he does, and yet I have learned a great deal from him, and feel I owe him much. He has thrown quite a new light on the old Italian church music, and has fired me with his lava-stream. He talks of it all with such glow and enthusiasm that one might say his speech blossoms. I have just come from taking leave of him, and as I was saying that he did not yet know the highest and best of all, for that in John Sebastian Bach the best of everything was to be found, he said Good-bye, we will knit our friendship in Luis da Vittoria (Palestrina's favourite pupil, and the best exponent of his traditions) and then we shall be like two lovers, each looking at the full moon, and in that act no longer feeling their separation.'[2]
One of Thibaut's greatest services to the cause of art was his collection of music, which included a very valuable series of Volkslieder of all nations. The catalogue was published in 1847 (Heidelberg) and Thibaut's widow endeavoured to sell it to one of the public libraries of Germany, but was unable to do so till 1850, when it was acquired for the court library of Munich. Of still greater value is his book 'Ueber Reinheit der Tonkünst' (Heidelberg 1825, with portrait of Palestrina; 2nd edition 1826). The title does not indicate (as his friend Bähr observes in the preface to the 3rd edition, 1853) purity either of construction or execution, but purity of the art itself. Music was to him an elevating, I might say a moral, art, and this treatise may justly claim to have exercised a moral influence. Thibaut maintains that as there is music which acts as a powerful agent in purifying and cultivating the mind, so there is music which has as depraving an influence as that exercised by immoral literature. From this point of view he urges the necessity of purity in music, and sets himself firmly against all that is shallow, common, unhealthy or frivolous. But this is difficult ground. His idea of impurity may be gathered from the fact that in the essay on instrumentation he unhesitatingly condemns the flutes, clarinets, and bassoons, added by Mozart to 'The people that walked in darkness,' urging that they entirely change the character of the piece. He also strongly censures the frequent changes of tempo and expression by which Mozart gives colour to his splendid motet 'Misericordias Domine.' The remaining articles are on the following topics: The Chorale; Church-music outside the Chorale; Volksgesänge; The study of models as a means of culture; Instrumentation as a means of effect; the great masters compared; Versatility; Corruptions of the text; and Choral unions. It is not too much to say that this book, dealing as it does in a spirit of great earnestness with questions which are at this moment agitating the musical world, will always be of interest. The last German edition came out in 1861. The English version ('Purity in Musical Art,' John Murray 1877) is by Mr. W. H. Gladstone, son of the Premier.