WALDTEUFEL, i.e. wood-demon. A toy, mentioned by Felix Mendelssohn in his childish letters to Goethe's boys (1821). It is a small cardboard drum, open at one end, with a catgut from the head to a neck in the end of a short stick. When the stick is whirled round, the catgut grates round the neck, and being reverberated by the drum, makes a loud humming noise. 'The sound of this in a room,' says Felix, 'is excruciating; out of doors, where they are going in hundreds at once, the noise is more bearable.' ('Goethe and Mendelssohn,' ed. 2, p. 28.)
WALDTEUFEL, Emil, a composer of dance music, who since the year 1878 has composed the prodigious number of more than 200 waltzes, polkas, and other dance tunes. His most favourite pieces are:—Waltzes, La Source, La Manola, Au revoir; Polka, Les Folies; P. Mazurkas, Dans les Bois; Marches, Marche du Trône; Galop, Prestissimo. Messrs. Boosey publish a 'Waldteufel Album,' containing his best pieces.
WALEY, Simon Waley, composer and pianist, was born in London in 1827. He began music with his sister, herself a pupil of Herz and Thalberg, and became a pupil successively of Moscheles, Bennett, and G. A. Osborne for the piano, and of W. Horsley and Molique for theory and composition. He began composing very early, and wrote several elaborate PF. pieces before he was 12. His first published work, 'L'Arpeggio,' a PF. study, appeared in 1848. It was speedily followed by a number of songs and pianoforte pieces, including a concerto with orchestral accompaniment, and 2 pianoforte trios, op. 15 in B♭, and op. 20 in G minor (published by Schott & Co.), both deserving to be better known. Simon Waley was an accomplished pianist, and frequently performed at the concerts of the Amateur Musical Society, conducted by Mr. H. Leslie. His compositions abound in the plaintive melody characteristic of Mendelssohn; they exhibit great finish, and a richness of detail and harmony not unworthy of the best disciples of the Leipzig school.
Besides being an artist, he was a practical and exceptionally shrewd man of business. At the age of 17 he wrote an able series of letters to the 'Times' advocating Boulogne as the postal route between England and the Continent, and a little later he contributed some sprightly letters on a tour in the Auvergne to the 'Daily News.' He was a prominent member of the London Stock Exchange, and for many years took an active part on the committee. He died in 1875 at the early age of 48. Mr. Waley belonged to the Jewish faith, and was a leading member of that community during the critical period of its emancipation from civil disabilities. One of his finest works is a choral setting of the 117th and 118th Psalms for the Synagogue service. There was a singular charm about his person and manner. To know him was to love him; and those who had the pleasure of his acquaintance will never forget the mingled modesty and sweetness of his disposition.
His published works, besides those already mentioned, contain a large number of pieces for piano, solo and duet; 2 duets for violin and piano; songs and duets, etc., etc. The choruses for the Synagogue mentioned above are published in vol. i. of the Musical Services of the West London Synagogue. Besides the printed works some orchestral pieces remain in MS.
WALKELEY, Anthony, born 1672, was a chorister and afterwards a vicar choral of Wells Cathedral. In 1700 [App. p.814 "1698"] he was appointed organist of Salisbury Cathedral as successor to Daniel Roseingrave. His Morning Service in E♭ is preserved in the Tudway Collection (Harl. MS. 7342), and anthems by him are in MS. at Ely Cathedral and in the library of the Royal College of Music. He died Jan. 16, 1717–18.
WALKER, Eberhardt Friedrich, an organ-builder at Cannstadt, Stuttgart, in the middle of the 18th century, and his son, of the same names, is one of the best builders in Germany. In 1820 he removed to Ludwigsburg. His European reputation is due to the fine organ which he built in 1833 for the church of St. Paul at Frankfort-on-the-Main. In 1856 he completed a large organ for Ulm Cathedral of 100 stops on 4 manuals and two pedals, and a new movement for drawing out all the stops in succession to produce a crescendo. This can be reversed for a diminuendo. In 1863 he carried his fame to the New World by erecting a large organ in the Music Hall, Boston, U.S.
WALKER, Joseph, & Sons, organ-builders in Francis Street, Tottenham Court Road, London. This business was established by Joseph Walker about the year 1819. He died in 1870, and the factory is still carried on by his sons. Amongst some hundreds of instruments we may name those in Exeter Hall (London), the Concert Room of the Crystal Palace (not that in the Handel Orchestra), in Romsey Abbey, St. Martin's, Leicester, and the Town Hall, Hobart Town, Armagh Cathedral, Bow Church, Cheapside, Sandringham Church, etc.
WALKÜRE, DIE, the Walkyrie; the second piece in the Tetralogie of Wagner's 'Ring des Nibelungen.' The entire poem was completed in 1852; the music of the Walküre in 1856, and the first performance took place at Munich June 25, 1870. Of Siegfried, which follows the Walküre in the Tetralogie, the composition was completed early in 1869, and the first performance took place at Bayreuth Aug. 16, 1876.
WALLACE (Grace) Lady, daughter of John Stein, Esq., of Edinburgh, married in 1836 Sir James Maxwell Wallace, who died 1867, and herself died 1878.
She translated the following musical works: Two vols. of Mendelssohn's Letters: From Italy and Switzerland (1862); From 1833 to 1847 (1863); Letters of Mozart, 2 vols. (1865); Reminiscences of Mendelssohn, by Elise Polko (1865); Letters of Beethoven, 2 vols. (1866); 'Letters of distinguished Musicians,' from a collection by Ludwig Nohl (1867); Nohl's 'Life
