Page:A Dictionary of Music and Musicians vol 3.djvu/694

Paris, where he had many pleasant connections through his wife, an Erard. He had been a member of the Institute since 1838. In 1844 the Pope made him Count of S. Andrea, and other distinctions followed. But the hope expressed by King Frederic William IV. that he would produce other works was not realised; Berlin had broken him down physically and mentally. He revisited Germany two or three times. In 1844 he was in Dresden, where Richard Wagner had prepared for him a performance of the 'Vestale,' which he conducted with all his old energy.^[1] He was invited to the Cologne Musical Festival of May 1847 to conduct some excerpts from 'Olympie,' and had a warm reception, but was too infirm to conduct, and his place was taken by Dorn, then Capell-meister at Cologne.^[2] In August he visited Berlin, and was most graciously received by the King, who gave him an invitation to conduct some of his own operas at Berlin during the ensuing winter. He was much delighted, and thought a great deal about the performances after his return to Paris, and also of the best manner in which he could express his gratitude and devotion to the King; but the project was never realised, as he was ill all the winter. In 1848 he became deaf, and his habitual gravity deepened into depression. He went back to Italy, and settled at Jesi, where he occupied himself in founding schools and other works of public utility. In 1850 he removed to Majolati, and there died Jan. 14, 1851. Having no children he left all his property to the poor of Jesi and Majolati.

[ P. S.]

SPONTONE, or SPONTONI, Bartolommeo, a madrigal composer, of whom nothing appears to be known beyond the fact that he published three sets of madrigals for five voices at Venice in 1564 (2nd ed. 1583), 1567, and 1583. Others are contained in the collections of Waelrant (1594) and others. Cipriano de Rore prints a Dialogo a 7 by him in 1568. A fine 4-part madrigal of Spontone's, 'The joyous birds,' is given by Mr. Hullah in his Part Music.

[ G. ]

SPORLE, Nathan James, whose real name was Burnett, born 1812, a tenor singer with an agreeable voice, first appeared in public about 1832 at the Grecian Saloon. He afterwards became a dinner singer, but was best known as the composer of many pleasing songs and ballads, one of which—'In the days when we went gipsying'—was very popular. He died March 2, 1853.

[ W. H. H. ]

SPRING GARDEN. See Vauxhall.

SPRINGING BOW (Ital. Saltato or Spicato; Fr. Sautillé). This kind of bowing is produced by the bow being dropped down on to the string from some distance, whereby, owing to the elasticity of the stick, it is set vibrating, and made to rebound after each note.

There are two principal kinds of springing bow.

1. The Spicato—chiefly used for the execution of quick passages formed of notes of equal duration—is produced by a loose movement of the wrist, about the middle of the bow. Well-known instances of it are the finale of Haydn's Quartet in D (op. 64, no. 5)—

the quick passages in the finale of Mendelssohn's Violin-concerto—

or Paganini's Perpetuum mobile. The Spicato is marked by dots over the notes. The so-called Martelé (hammered), indicated by dashes—

—is not really a kind of springing bow, but merely indicates that a passage is to be executed by short strongly accentuated strokes of the bow, which however has not actually to leave the string as in the 'springing bow.'

2. The Saltato, for which the bow is made to fall down from a considerable distance, and therefore rebounds much higher than in the Spicato. This kind of bowing is chiefly used where a number of notes have to be played in one stroke of the springing bow, as in arpeggios (Cadenza of Mendelssohn's Violin-Concerto), or such phrases as the first subject of the Finale of the same work—

which, if played as a firm staccato would sound heavy. Another well-known instance of the saltato is the beginning of the Finale of Paganini's first Concerto.

3. A kind of quick staccato, much employed by Paganini and the modern French School, must be mentioned here, because it is really a kind of saltato; the bow being violently thrown down, and so being made to rebound a great many times for a long succession of notes in such quick time that their execution by a firm staccato and a separate movement of the wrist for each note would be impossible.

[ P. D. ]

SPRÜCHE—proverbs, or sentences—are sung in the Lutheran service of the Berlin Cathedral after the reading of the Epistle:

1. On New Year's Day, 'Herr Gott du bist unser Zuflucht.'
2. On Good Friday, 'Um unser Sünden willen.'
3. On Ascension day, 'Erhaben o Herr.'
4. On Christmas day, 'Frohlocket, ihr Volker.'

1. For a clever and amusing account of it see Wagner's 'Gesammelte Schriften,' v. 114.
2. Dorn's 'Aus meinem Leben,' vol. Hi. p. 21.