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 TWELFTH EDITION

THEATRE
BRIEF

Robert Cohen
Donovan Sherman
 Brief Contents

Preface iii Chapter 1 What Is Theatre? 6

Introduction 1
Chapter 2 What Is a Play? 20
Chapter 3 The Actor 36
Chapter 4 The Playwright 55
Chapter 5 Designers and Technicians 80
Chapter 6 The Director 134
Chapter 7 Theatre Traditions 179
Chapter 8 The Modern Theatre 205
Chapter 9 Musical Theatre 232
Glossary G-1
Selected Bibliography B-1
Chapter 10 Theatre Today 247
Index I-1 Chapter 11 The Audience 299

Chapter 12 The Ancients

create.mheducation.com Chapter 13 The Middle Ages
Chapter 14 The Renaissance
Chapter 15 The Theatre of Asia
Chapter 16 The Royal Era
Chapter 17 The Modern Theatre: Realism
Chapter 18 The Modern Theatre: Antirealism
Appendix: Enjoy the Play!

vii
Contents

Chapter 1 What Is Theatre? 6 Preface iii

Introduction 1
spotlight: Why Study Theatre? 7

The Theatre Building 8

The Theatre Company 10
The Occupation of Theatre 10
Work 11
Art 13
Impersonation 13
Performance 13
Live Performance 16
Scripted and Rehearsed Performance 17
spotlight: Film Stars on Stage Acting 18

Chapter 2 What Is a Play? 20

Classifying Plays 21
Duration 21
Genre 23
Tragedy 23
Comedy 24
stagecraft: Genre-ly Speaking 24
Other Genres 26
Dramaturgy: The Construction of Drama
and Dramatic Performance 27
Drama’s Components 28
Plot 28
Character 28
Thought 28
Diction 29
Music 30
Spectacle 30
Convention 30
Drama’s Timeline 32
Pre-Play 32
Play 32
Post-Play 35

viii
 Contents ix

Chapter 3 The Actor 36

Approaches to Acting 37
The External Method 38
The Internal Method 39
The Paradox of Acting 41
stagecraft: Basic Acting Exercises 44
Becoming an Actor 45
Creating a Character 45
The Actor’s Instrument 46
The Actor’s Discipline 48
The Actor’s Routine 49
Audition 49
Rehearsal 49
Performance 50
photo essay: Actor Sir Patrick Stewart 51

Chapter 4 The Playwright 55

Playwriting as Event Writing 56
The Qualities of a Play 58
Credibility and Intrigue 58
Speakability, Stageability, and Flow 59
Richness 62
Depth of Characterization 62
Gravity and Pertinence 64
Compression and Economy 65
Celebration 67
The Playwright’s Process 67
Dialogue 67
Conflict 68
Structure 68
The Playwright’s Rewards 69
A Sampling of Current American
Playwrights 69
Young Jean Lee 70
Annie Baker 70
Tarell Alvin McCraney 73
Suzan-Lori Parks 74
Ayad Akhtar 75
photo essay: Playwright Young Jean Lee 77
x Contents

Chapter 5 Designers and Technicians 80

The Design Process 81
What Design Does 82
Scenery 83
Scenic Materials 88
spotlight: Henslowe’s Diary 88

stagecraft: Quince’s “Significant” Moon 90

The Scenic Designer at Work 93
photo essay: Scenic Designer Scott Pask 94

Lighting 98
Contemporary Lighting Design 100
The Lighting Designer at Work 101
photo essay: Lighting Designer Don Holder 104

Costumes 108
The Functions of Costume 108
The Costume Designer at Work 110
photo essay: Costume Designer Catherine
Zuber 112

Makeup 116
stagecraft: The Makeup Kit 118
Sound Design 119
photo essay: Sound Designer Scott Lehrer 121

Puppets and Projections 124

Puppets 124
Projections 125
Special Effects 127
Digital Technologies in Theatre Design 128
The Technical Production Team 129
photo essay: Broadway Stage Manager Lisa
Iacucci 131

Chapter 6 The Director 134

A Historical Overview 135
Teacher-Directors 136
Directors of Realism 136
Directors of Antirealism 137
 Contents xi

Global Directors 137

Contemporary Directors 140
photo essay: Director Susan Stroman 141

The Directing Process: Step by Step 144

The Pre-Preparation Period 144
The Preparation Period 144
Conceptualizing the Production 146
The Core Concept 146
The High Concept 147
Consulting the Dramaturg 149
Implementation Period 149
spotlight: Dramaturg Jerry Patch 150
Selecting the Designers 151
Collaborating with the Designers 151
Casting the Actors 152
spotlight: Diversity and Casting 155

photo essay: Casting Director James

Calleri 156

Rehearsals 158
Staging 158
Actor-Coaching 161
Pacing 163
stagecraft: “This Is How It’s Done!” 163
Coordinating 165
Presenting 165
The Training of a Director 166
photo essay: The Tempest 167

Chapter 7 Theatre Traditions 179

The Origins of Theatre 180
Ritual 180
Storytelling 181
Shamanism, Trance, and Magic 183
The Beginnings of Traditional Drama 184
Traditional Drama in Sub-Saharan Africa 184
Egyptian Drama 185
Theatre in the West 185
Greek Drama 185
Roman Drama 188
xii Contents

Medieval Drama 189

Renaissance Drama 192
The Royal Theatre 194
spotlight: Did Shakespeare Write
Shakespeare? 195

The Romantic Theatre 196

Theatre in the East 197
Indian Sanskrit Drama 197
Indian Kathakali 198
Chinese Xiqu 199
Japanese Noh 200
Japanese Kabuki 202

Chapter 8 The Modern Theatre 205

Global Modern Drama 206
Realism 207
A Laboratory 207
Pioneers of Realism 208
Naturalism 212
spotlight: Interview with Oskar Eustis 213

Antirealism 215
The Symbolist Rebellion 215
The Era of Isms 216
Stylized Theatre 218
Surrealism and the Avant-Garde: Ubu Roi 219
Expressionism: Machinal 220
Metatheatre: Six Characters in Search
of an Author 222
Postmodern Farce: Cloud Nine 224
Theatre of Cruelty: Jet of Blood 225
Theatre of the Absurd: Waiting for Godot 226
Contemporary Allegory: Dutchman 228
Theatre of Alienation: The Good Person of
Szechuan 229

Chapter 9 Musical Theatre 232

The Role of Music in Theatre History 233
The Broadway Musical 234
Musical Comedy 235
A Golden Age 236
 Contents xiii

The Contemporary Musical 238

The Emergence of Choreographer-Directors 238
Stephen Sondheim 240
Black Musicals 240
The Disney Monolith 242
England and France 243
Musicals of The Twenty-First Century 244

Chapter 10 Theatre Today 247

What’s Happening? 248
Theatre and Identity 249
Theatre, Gender, and Sexuality 250
Theatre and Race 253
Theatre and Ability 257
photo essay: Theatre in the Borderlands 259
Intersectional Theatre 260
Spectacular Theatre 260
Performance Art 261
Dangerous Theatre 263
Theatre of Community 264
Physical Theatre 267
Solo Performance 270
Intimate Theatre 272
Finding Theatre in the United States 276
Theatre in New York 276
Broadway 276
Off-Broadway and Off-Off-Broadway 277
Regional American Theatre 278
Shakespeare Festivals 279
Summer and Dinner Theatres 280
Amateur Theatre: Academic and Community 281
The Global Theatre 283
Theatre in English-Speaking Countries 285
Theatre in Non-English-Speaking Countries 289
Theatre Innovators Today 293
Ivo van Hove 293
Jesusa Rodríguez 294
Rimini Protokoll 295
Ong Keng Sen 297
Conclusions about Theatre Today? 298
xiv Contents

Chapter 11 The Audience 299

Critical Perspectives 300
Social Significance 300
Human Significance 300
Artistic Quality 301
Theatrical Expression 302
spotlight: Performance Studies 302

Entertainment Value 303

Critical Focus 304
Professional Criticism 304 Glossary G-1
Amateur Criticism 305 Selected Bibliography B-1
We Are the Critics 306 Index I-1

Chapter 12 The Ancients

Chapter 13 The Middle Ages create.mheducation.com
Chapter 14 The Renaissance
Chapter 15 The Theatre of Asia
Chapter 16 The Royal Era
Chapter 17 The Modern Theatre: Realism
Chapter 18 The Modern Theatre: Antirealism
Appendix: Enjoy the Play!

©Sara Krulwich/The New York Times/Redux
I T IS EVENING IN MANHATTAN. On Broadway the mar-
quees light up, and “Performance Tonight” signs appear
in front of double doors. Beneath a few box-office win-
dows placards announce, “This Performance Com-
pletely Sold Out.” At Grand Central Station and Penn
Station, trains release eager suburbanites from Green-
wich, Larchmont, and Trenton; students from New
Haven and Philadelphia; and day-trippers from Boston
and Washington. Out of the Times Square subways
pour mobs of locals, inhabitants of the bustling island
and the neighboring boroughs. They head to the TKTS
booth to line up and buy the discount tickets that go on
sale a few hours before curtain time for shows with seats
yet to be filled. Now, converging on these few midtown
blocks of America’s most populated city, come buses,
cars, taxis, and limousines, whose drivers search for a
curbside slot to deposit their riders among the milling
throngs of pedestrians. Wall Street bankers, college
students, teenagers gazing at their smartphones, sleek
executives in expensive suits, Brooklyn hipsters, arm-
in-arm widows, out-of-town tourists and conventioneers,
celebrities, honeymooners, old and young, people of all
different cultures, classes, and identities—all commingle
in this bizarre mass that is the New York Broadway
audience. Even during (and perhaps especially during)
troubled times in this vibrant city, it is as bright, bold,
and varied a crowd as is likely to assemble at any single
place in America.
It is eight o’clock. In close to forty theatres within
two dozen blocks of each other, houselights dim, cur-
tains rise, and spotlights pick out performers who have
Introduction
fervently waited for this moment to arrive. Here a hot
new musical, here a star-studded revival of an American
classic, here a contemporary English comedy from Lon-
don’s West End, here a new play fresh from its electrify-
ing Seattle or Chicago premiere, here a one-woman
show, here an experimental play that has transferred to
larger quarters, here a touring production from eastern
Europe, and here the new play everyone expects will
capture this year’s coveted Tony Award. The hours pass.
It’s 10:30. Pandemonium. All the double doors open
simultaneously, as if on cue, and once again the thou-
sands pour out into the night. At nearby restaurants,
servers stand by to receive the after-theatre onslaught.
In the private upstairs room at Sardi’s restaurant, an
opening-night cast party gets under way; downstairs,
the patrons rehash the evening’s entertainment and
sneak covert glances at celebrities. Actors sip their
drinks while impatiently awaiting the reviews that will
determine whether they will be employed next week or
back on the street looking for new jobs.
Now let’s turn back the clock. It is dawn in Athens,
the thirteenth day of the month of Elaphebolion in
the year 458 B.C.E. From thousands of low mud-brick
homes in the city, from the central agora, and from
temples and agricultural outposts, streams of Athenians
and visitors converge on the south slope of the Acropo-
lis, Athens’s great hill and home of its grandest temples.
Bundled against the morning dampness, carrying break-
fast figs and flagons of wine, they pay their tokens at the
entrance to the great Theatre of Dionysus and take their
places in the seating spaces allotted them. They have
1
2 Introduction

Plays were often the sources of films in the early days of cinema, but now major films are increasingly turned into
plays—mostly musicals—and very successful ones (for example, The Lion King, The Producers, Once). This scene is
from the 2012 Broadway hit Newsies, adapted by Disney from its 1992 film of that name; the musical won Tony Awards
for both its score and choreography. ©Sara Krulwich/The New York Times/Redux

gathered for the City Dionysia festival, which celebrates
the rebirth of the land and the long sunny days that
stretch ahead. It is a time for revelry and for rejoicing in
fertility and all its fruits. And it is above all a time for
the ultimate form of Dionysian worship: the theatre.
The open stone seats carved into the hillside fill up
quickly. The crowd of seventeen thousand comprises
not only the majority of Athenian citizens but also
thousands of tradesmen, foreign visitors, slaves, and
resident aliens. Even paupers are in attendance,
thanks to the two obols apiece provided by a state
fund to buy tickets for the poor; they take their place
with the latecomers on the extremities of the theat-
ron, as this first of theatre buildings is called. Now, as
the eastern sky grows pale, a masked and costumed
actor appears atop a squat building set in full view of
every spectator. A hush falls over the crowd, and the
actor, his voice magnified by the wooden mask he
wears, booms out this text:
I ask the gods some respite from the weariness of
this watchtime measured by years I lie awake . . .
The entranced spectators settle in, secure in the knowl-
edge that today they are in good hands. Today they will
hear and see a new version of a familiar story—the
story of Agamemnon’s homecoming and his murder;
the revenge of that murder by his son, Orestes; and the
final disposition of justice in the case of Orestes’ act—
as told in the three tragedies that constitute The Ores-
teia. This magnificent trilogy is by Aeschylus, Athens’s
leading dramatist for more than forty years. The spec-
tators watch closely, admiring but critical. Tomorrow
they or their representatives will decide by vote
whether the festival’s prize should go to this work, or
 Theatre 3

Singer, songwriter, guitarist, thumb pianist, and now playwright,

Jonatha Brooke, wrote and performed her one-woman play, My
Mother Has 4 Noses, to great success off-Broadway in 2014, basing
her play on the last years of her own mother’s life—and playing both
her mother and herself. ©Sandrine Lee

whether the young Sophocles, whose plays were pre-

sented in this space the day before, had better sensed
the true pulse of the time.
Let’s zoom ahead in time. It is noon in London, and
Queen Elizabeth I sits on the throne. Flags fly boldly
atop three of the taller buildings in Bankside, across the
Thames, announcing performance day at The Globe,
The Rose, and The Swan theatres. Boatmen have already
begun ferrying theatregoers across the river, where The
Globe will present a new tragedy by Shakespeare (some- Theatre is not always grandiose. Samuel Beckett virtually revolutionized
thing called Hamlet), and The Rose promises a revival of the theatre in 1958 with his Waiting for Godot, which basically shows two
Christopher Marlowe’s popular Dr. Faustus. North of men under a tree waiting for a man who never comes. It was ridiculed at
town, The Fortune and The Curtain are likewise opening first, but by 2000 was cited as the greatest play of the century. From
their gates for new plays of their own. there his plays were steadily reduced in characters and actions until, in
his 1972 Not I, there was but one performer—whose mouth, eight feet
Now at The Globe, two thousand spectators have ar- above the stage, is all the audience sees. This 2014 performance was
rived for the premiere. A trumpet sounds, then sounds performed by Lisa Dwan at the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Harvey
again, and then builds into a full fanfare. Members of the Theatre. ©Sara Krulwich/The New York Times/Redux
4 Introduction  
Some plays never die. This Pulitzer Prize–winning 1936 production of Moss Hart and George S. Kaufman’s farce
You Can’t Take It With You flooded the stage with fireworks in its 2014 Broadway revival, directed by Scott Ellis.
©Sara Krulwich/The New York Times/Redux
audience, standing on the ground before the stage or
seated in bleachers overlooking it, exchange a few final
winks with their friends old and new before turning their
attention to the platform stage. Through a giant door a
guard bursts forth, lantern in hand. “Who’s there?,” he
cries, and across from him another guard hollers, “Nay!
Answer me!” In two thousand imaginations, the bright
afternoon has turned to midnight, London’s Bankside
has given way to the battlements of Denmark’s Elsinore,
and a terrified shiver from the onstage actor has set up
an answering chill among the audience members. A
great new tragedy has begun its course.
It is midnight in a basement in the East Village, or in
a campus rehearsal room, or in a coffee shop in Pitts-
burgh, Seattle, Sioux Falls, or Berlin. Across one end of
the room, a curtain has been drawn across a pole sus-
pended by wires. It has been a long evening, but one
play remains to be seen. The author is unknown, but
rumor has it that this new work is brutal, shocking, po-
etic, and strange. The members of the audience, by
turns skeptical and enthusiastic, look for the tenth time
at their programs. The lights dim. Performers, backed
by crudely painted packing crates, begin to act.
What is the common denominator in all of these
scenes? They are all theatre. There is no culture that
has not had a theatre in some form, for theatre is the
art of people acting out—and giving witness to—their
most pressing, illuminating, and inspiring concerns.
Theatre is a medium through which a society displays
its ideas, fashions, moralities, and entertainments, and
debates its conflicts, dilemmas, yearnings, and strug-
gles. Theatre has provided a stage for political revolu-
tion, social propaganda, civil debate, artistic expression,
religious conversion, mass education, and even its own
self-criticism. It has been a performance ground for
priests, shamans, intellectuals, poets, painters, tech-
nologists, philosophers, reformers, evangelists, jug-
glers, peasants, children, and kings. It has taken place
in caves, fields, and forests; in circus tents, inns, and
castles; on street corners and in public buildings grand

and squalid all over the world. And it goes on inces-
santly in the minds of its authors, actors, producers,
designers, and audiences.
Theatre is, above all, a living art form. It consists
not only of plays but also of playing, and a play is not
simply a series of acts but a collective ritual of acting.
Just as play and act are both noun and verb, so theatre
is both a thing and a happening, a result and a pro-
cess: it is fluid in time and rich in feeling and human
experience.
Above all, then, theatre is live and alive: an art that
continually forms before our eyes and is present to an
audience even as it is presented by its actors. In fact, this
very quality of “presentness” (or, in the actor’s termi-
nology, “stage presence”) defines every great theatrical
performance.
Unlike the more static arts, theatre presents us with
a number of classic paradoxes:
• It is spontaneous, yet it is rehearsed.
• It is real, yet it is simulated.
Theatre 5
• It is unique to the moment, yet it is repeatable.
• The actors are themselves, yet they play characters.
• Audience members believe in the characters, yet
they know they are actors.
• Audience members become emotionally involved,
yet they know it is only a play.
These paradoxes comprise the glory of theatre. The
actors may “live in the moment” during their perfor-
mances, yet they have carefully studied, planned, and
rehearsed the details of their roles beforehand. And
audience members respond to their performance by
rooting for their characters to achieve their goals, and
then applauding the actors who play those roles during
the curtain call. But this is also how we live our own
lives, which we both experience and, at various points,
present to others. The theatre shows us to ourselves in
all of our human complexity.
And so this book about the theatre is also, ultimately,
a book about ourselves.
Chapter
1
What Is
Theatre?
W HAT IS THEATRE? To start, let’s look at the origin
of the word. Theatre comes from the Greek theatron, or
“seeing place.” So on a basic level, a theatre is a place
where something is seen. Already, with this simple defi-
nition, we gain an important clue about what theatre is.
For something to be seen, after all, there must be people
to do the seeing. So the theatre involves those who
watch and those who are watched—the audience and the
actors onstage.
Theatre depends on a separation of the viewer and
the viewed. This separation need not be literal, however.
In fact, some of the most powerful theatre happening
today happens very intimately, with performers mere
inches away from the audience. Rather, the separation
of the theatre is something abstract, a feeling of dis-
tance between the viewer and what is seen. Theatre can
simply be the result of a change in the attitude of the
6
©Evgenia Eliseeva
spectator: If I take on the attitude that I am watching
life around me as if it were onstage, the everyday can
suddenly take on a magical quality.
This kind of theatre—we might call this a theatre of
perception—is demonstrated beautifully by a section of
the High Line, a public park in New York City built on
old railroad tracks elevated above the bustling city
streets. In one section of the park, pedestrians can en-
ter an “urban theatre”—a set of benches and aisles in
front of a stage. But this “stage” is not typical: it’s a big
window that frames a busy intersection. Walkers on the
High Line can sit on a bench and watch the spectacle
of people rushing to work, hailing a cab, talking
on their phones, laughing with their friends, and
otherwise carrying on with their lives. When viewed
as if they were on a stage, these actions take on a
new sense of importance. Their circumstances are

heightened. They might not realize it, but they are
performing!
Another kind of theatrical separation can exist when
audience members might not realize they are an audi-
ence. The “invisible theatre” of the Brazilian activist and
director Augusto Boal often used this technique. Boal’s
actors would stage an altercation on the street, only to
reveal to onlookers afterward that they were, in fact, just
performing. Suddenly passersby became audience mem-
bers, where before they were bystanders. And these audi-
ence members were forced to question their own
“performances” in the play that took place: Did they help
the person under attack? Or did they just watch or even
inch away?
Most of the time, though, audiences and performers
know that they are part of a theatrical event. They have a
mutual understanding. The audience will watch and react
to the play, and the performers will put on a show. Every-
one knows that what happens will be different than every-
day life. Even if the play attempts to emulate everyday
life—and some of the theatre we will examine in this book
does exactly that—it still does so in circumstances that
make it, in some way, extraordinary.
To summarize our description thus far, theatre
describes a set of heightened circumstances that depend
Spotlight
Why Study Theatre?
Perhaps you are reading this book because you have a
deep passion for theatre. However, chances are that some
of you are also reading this book because you are just
curious about theatre, or perhaps simply to get college
credit. These are all perfectly fine reasons. One of the
book’s aims is to show you how knowledge of theatre can
help you in many different settings, not just onstage. Re-
gardless of your reasons for reading this book and of how
frequently you engage with theatre afterward, know-
ing more about theatre can help you in both your profes-
sional and personal life.
This thought might give you pause. You might think, “Isn’t
theatre a lofty occupation?” It is, but it is also a highly prag-
matic one. As we will discuss, it is first and foremost work.
While studying theatre can be enormously rewarding for ab-
stract reasons—for instance, it gives us an appreciation of
culture and history—it also helps improve your occupational
skills. And you do not even need to work in theatre to capi-
talize on your theatre studies. Theatre skills are crucial for
work in law, education, and business. After all, if you study
Theatre 7
At the High Line park in New York City, spectators can sit at the “urban
theatre” section to witness the ongoing play of the city itself. ©Francois
Roux/Shutterstock
on a separation (whether acknowledged or not) of audi-
ence and performer. But we also use the word to refer to
the physical space in which theatre often takes place.
Theatre can occur in a theatre. It could also exist else-
where, though. In this book, we will examine theatre that
takes place in streets, in homes, in abandoned weapons
factories, and in quarries—just to name a few examples.
But even then, we refer to these spaces as a theatre. They
transform, just as the performers do, from ordinary to
exceptional.
and participate in theatre, you know how to work as a team,
listen to other opinions, collaborate across different skill
sets, and learn how to speak in front of a crowd.
People who have theatre degrees, or who have studied
theatre in college, draw on their skills constantly. If you have
to give a speech to your coworkers or superiors, if you have
to devise a project with a group of people you don’t know
well but with whom you must collaborate, if you have an
encroaching deadline and need to find a creative solution
to a problem, or if you have to analyze a document and
share your interpretation, then you are using theatre skills.
You’re not that different from an actor stepping onto the
stage, a director meeting for the first time with an artistic
team, or a performer picking up a script minutes before an
audition.
Experiencing theatre gives us confidence, and it is not,
contrary to some understandings of the word, a fake or
negative kind of confidence. As we discuss in this book,
theatre is about pursuing the truth, not artifice. It’s an effort
of a group of people trying to create something new—and
can’t the same be said for nearly every line of work? Study-
ing theatre gives us what theatre scholar Nancy Kindelan
calls “artistic literacy”—a fluency in thinking creatively in a
variety of settings. Theatre skills help us constantly because
theatre, in some form, is everywhere.
8 Chapter 1 What Is Theatre?

In addition to a theatre building, there’s yet another
way we can use the word theatre: the collection of artists
who create the theatre. We call this collection the com-
pany. So the theatre can be a physical place, what hap-
pens in that place, and the people who create what
happens in that place. To take one example, when we
refer to the Guthrie Theater, we refer to (1) the actual
building in Minneapolis called the Guthrie Theater:
(2) what happens in that building—the performed actions
and the audiences who watch them; and (3) the artists
and administrators who create these occurrences.
Finally, we also use the word theatre to summon the
professional occupation—and often the passion—of thou-
sands of men and women all over the world. It is a voca-
tion and sometimes a lifelong devotion. If someone says,
“I work in theatre,” they are telling you that they work in
a theatre, they participate in the activity of theatre, they
collaborate with other theatre artists, and—perhaps most
importantly—that they are inspired by theatre. Theatre is
an occupation and an art. To work in the theatre is not
just to labor, but also to create.
We have already discussed one definition of theatre—
the separation of actor and audience—so let’s now exam-
ine the three other main definitions: theatre as a building,
a company, and an occupation.
The Theatre Building
When you picture the space of the theatre, you probably
imagine a big room with seats, a stage, and maybe a curtain.
A theatre building is not always an enclosed structure, how-
ever. The most ancient Greek theatron was probably no

Shakespeare’s Globe has been meticulously reconstructed near its sixteenth-century location on the South Bank of
London’s Thames River. The reconstruction was spearheaded by the late Sam Wanamaker, an American actor who
labored many years to acquire the funding and necessary permits (the theatre has the first thatch roof laid in London
since the Great Fire of 1666). This is scholarship’s best guess as to the specific dimensions and features of The Globe
in Shakespeare’s time. Since its 1997 opening, this Globe has produced a summer repertoire of the plays of
Shakespeare’s age, seen on a stage much like the stages for which they were written. ©Robert Cohen

National theatre buildings in many European countries, generally supported by their governments, are often palatial.
The National Theatre in Cluj, Romania, is regarded as the most beautiful building in this Transylvanian capital.
©Robert Cohen
more than a circle of bare earth where performers chanted
and danced before a hillside of seated spectators. The re-
quirements for building such a theatre were minimal: find a
space to act and a space to watch and hear.
As theatre grew in popularity and importance, and spread
out into different cultures and geographical locations, its
structures grew larger and more elaborate. The theatre’s pro-
ducers had to seat larger and larger numbers of people, so
the hillside soon became an ascending bank of seats, each
level providing a good view of the acting area. And as the
theatre grew, attention had to be paid to its acoustics, or
sound quality (derived from the Greek acoustos, “heard”), so
the sounds coming from the stage could be heard by the au-
dience (from the Latin audientia, “those who hear”).
Often, theatre spaces can be easily defined. The basic
relationship set up in ancient Greece can still apply to
Theatre 9
theatres all over the world: the audiences are out in the
seats, the actors are up on the stage. Occasionally, though,
the spaces are merged together so that the actors mingle—
and sometimes interact—with the audience.
Theatre buildings may also be complex. Greek the-
atres of the fourth century b.c.e.—the period immediately
following the golden age of Greek playwrights—were gi-
gantic stone structures, some capable of holding up to
17,000 spectators. Magnificent three-story Roman the-
atres, complete with gilded columns, canvas awnings, and
intricate marble carvings, were often erected for dramatic
festivals in the later years of the Republic. Grand, free-
standing Elizabethan theatres dominate the London sky-
line in illustrated sixteenth-century pictorial maps of the
town. Opulent theatres were built throughout Europe and
in the major cities of the United States in the eighteenth
10 Chapter 1 What Is Theatre?

Theatre buildings need not be originally designed for theatre. Since 2007, audiences have flocked to the Park Avenue
Armory in New York City to see theatre on a grand scale. In this 55,000-square-foot space, which was previously an
ammunition storehouse, artists can realize spectacular visions, as with Heiner Goebbels’s 2016 staging of Louis
Andriessen’s De Materie, pictured here. ©Stephanie Berger

and nineteenth centuries. Many remain in full operation
today, competing with splendid new stages and serving as
cultural centers for metropolitan areas around the world.
The Theatre Company
Theatre is a collaborative art that involves dozens, or even
hundreds, of people working closely together on a single
performance. Historically, theatre practitioners of various
specialties have teamed up in long-standing companies.
Since the fourth century b.c.e., such troupes of players
have toured the countrysides and settled in cities to pres-
ent a repertory, or collection of plays, as a means of earn-
ing a livelihood. Generally such players have included
actors, playwrights, and technicians—and often combina-
tions thereof—who make the company a self-contained
production unit capable of writing, preparing, and present-
ing whole theatrical works. Some of these troupes—and
the works they produced—have become legendary. The
Lord Chamberlain’s Men, in London, counted William
Shakespeare as a member. The Illustrious Theatre of Paris
was founded and headed by the great actor-writer Molière.
These companies remind us that the theatre depends on
more than space; it also needs people. And these people
represent the genius and creativity of theatre in ways that
the buildings alone cannot.
The Occupation of Theatre
Theatre can be a full-time job for professionals or a hobby
for amateurs. In either case, it is work. The fundamental
act of theatre seems simple enough: actors impersonate
characters in a live performance of a play. But an enor-
mous amount of labor goes into this activity, including the
design and creation of the set and props, the orientation
of the lights, and the direction of the action to the actors—
as well as countless other long hours spent honing special-
ized crafts and collaborating with other artists. We can
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given anywhere in France without his permission, for which he
received a sum of money. He was such a tyrant that he had many
enemies, some of whom tried to poison his snuff, in order to get rid
of the King’s favorite.
“Le Roi Soleil” (The Sun King), as Louis XIV was called, had to be
entertained, and Lully understood so well how to keep him amused,
that the King could not get along without his composer whose
performances dazzled all beholders!
You must read French history of that period in order to
understand just how gorgeous and how extravagant life at the palace
of Versailles was and how eventually it led to the revolt of the people
and the French Revolution. Or perhaps you have seen the elaborate
gardens, fountains and palace,—a playground built at fearful cost
where the Kings of France might forget their cares! The King went so
far as to give Lully a post of royal secretary, usually held by nobles. It
is said that his only claim to the position was that he made people
laugh!
In 1681, his ballet Triomphe de l’Amour (Triumph of Love) was
given, in which, for the first time, women instead of men danced.
Indeed, ladies of the nobility took part in the ballet!
The French Overture introduced by Lully, was in two parts or
movements,—the first slow and serious, the second by way of
contrast fast, and bringing in the contrapuntal style of the church
composers; sometimes a third part resembling the first was added.
These overtures were very much liked in Lully’s time and during the
18th century, and was the form used by the German composers in
their orchestral suites and by Handel. Lully was very successful in
composing military music, and his military marches were used not
only by the French army, but by the armies marching against
France. All of his music is simple and clear in outline, it is easy to
remember, its rhythm is vigorous and definite, and the people, as
well as musicians of his day, loved and understood it. One writer said
that one of his songs from Amadis, an opera (1684), “was sung by
every cook in France and Lully would stop his carriage on the Pont
Neuf (the New Bridge across the Seine) to set some poor fiddler right
who was playing one of his airs.” His works reached Italy, Germany,
England, Holland and Flanders, and influenced many of the
composers like Purcell, Humphrey and Handel to say nothing of the
French composers who followed him.
Lully built up the orchestra, and used the different groups of
instruments in entirely new ways.
Lully died in 1687 as the result of having dropped the stick with
which he directed his orchestra on his foot. This does not sound
possible, but the baton used in his time was very large and heavy,
and the accident caused blood poisoning. He was very much missed,
for there was no one with his talent for conducting and disciplining
the singers and dancers to replace him.
 Rameau

In 1683, was born another French composer who carried on the

work that Lully had begun, a work so much loved by the French
public, that Jean Philippe Rameau found as strong a rival in the dead
Lully as his contemporaries had in the living. Rameau’s father was
organist of a church at Dijon, and although the family was very poor,
the father was determined to give his three children a musical
education, and began to teach them before they could read. As a
result of this early training little Jean Philippe, when he was only
seven years old, could play at sight on the harpsichord any music put
before him, and when he was sent to school, he was very unruly and
sang out loud in class or scribbled music all over his papers instead
of doing his lessons.
When he was eighteen, he went to Italy, but as he did not like the
music, he left. He was always headstrong and self-willed, and this
was one of the hasty decisions for which he was afterwards sorry. He
traveled from place to place on this journey, playing his way as he
went, on the organ in churches and the violin in a band of traveling
musicians. In the south of France, old Provence, the home of the
troubadours, he became organist at Clermont, and lived quietly for
six years. Here he wrote his first pieces for clavecin (spinet) and
three cantatas. (The cantata was a new form which came from Italy,
and was a small opera to be sung in a drawing-room.) When Rameau
grew tired of his work as organist at Clermont, he showed his
discontent by playing as badly as he possibly could, by using
untuneful organ-stops and by playing fearful discords. An attempt
was made to shut him off but he paid no attention until a choir boy
was sent to him with a message, whereupon he left the organ and
walked out of the church. He finally succeeded in making the
directors give him his release, but before many years he returned to
his old post, and was taken back in spite of his disagreeable temper,
and so proud was Clermont of its organist, that his chair is still kept
and exhibited.
From Clermont he went to Paris where he studied with the
organist Marchand, and read the old books of musical theory such as
Zarlino’s, for Rameau during his career wrote five important books
on musical theory and harmony. He was the first to establish
definitely the classic principles of harmony, and to put them into a
form that for many years was used by all students. You must
remember that up to the 17th century, counterpoint was the chief
study, but when Italian opera succeeded in breaking down the
polyphonic habit, a new science had to be made to explain the new
system of chords that had been gradually built up by the Italians and
also by Luther and his chorals. This was the science of harmony, and
Rameau’s Treatise of Music, containing the Principles of
Composition (1722), was one of the first books of its kind.
Until Rameau was fifty, he was known as an organist, a teacher of
composition and a writer of many charming works for harpsichord
and clavecin. He married a young singer when he was 43, and the
year after, he made the acquaintance of a wealthy patron of the arts,
at whose house he met artists, literary men, princes and
embassadors. Rameau taught his patron’s wife, and had the use of
his organ and private orchestra. Here he first found himself among
friends who understood and appreciated his talents; here he met the
great French writer, Voltaire, and the Abbé Pellegrin, both of whom
wrote librettos for his operas. There is a tale that the Abbé made the
composer sign an agreement about payment for the use of his book
but after hearing the first rehearsal he tore it up—so pleased was he
with Rameau’s first opera, Hippolyte et Aricie (1733). Now Rameau
met the jealousy of Lully’s followers, who tried to prevent the success
of the work. They hissed it and wrote slighting verse about it:
If difficulties beauty show,
Then what a great man is Rameau.
If beauty, though, by chance should be
But nature’s own simplicity,
Then what a small man is Rameau!—

(Frederick H. Martens’ translation of A History of Music by Paul

Landormy.)
It is curious how often a new style in music has been greeted with
just such criticism and prejudice as the “Lullyists” showed for
Rameau’s opera! They claimed that the work was not French, that he
used strange chords, that his music was too difficult to be
understood! In fact they said exactly the same things that are said
today about new works which are different from what the public is
used to hearing. Voltaire said that it takes a whole generation for the
human ear to grow familiar with a new musical style!
His third opera, Castor and Pollux, in 1737, was his first real
success. With this work, he became famous, and was regarded as
France’s greatest composer. An English noble in Paris at the time
stated “that although everyone was abusing Rameau’s ‘horrible’
work, yet it was impossible to get a seat at the opera.”
Although Rameau brought nothing new to opera, he was the step
between the Lully traditions and the innovators who came with
Gluck. The French composers today turn to him in their search for
the direct road along which French music has traveled.
In spite of Rameau’s unfriendly reserved nature, he won fame by
force of his genius. He was as unlike Lully as two men could possibly
have been. Rameau accepted favors from no one, and was generous
in his attitude towards his fellow composers. He talked very little and
was not popular. However, he was at the height of his career, when a
company of Italian singers arrived in Paris (1752), and played La
Serva Padrona by Pergolesi. The fresh sparkling little opera took
Paris by storm, and this was the beginning of a sharp fight known as
the war of the buffoons (page 330), which divided Paris into two
factions,—those who stood by Lully and Rameau, and those who
wanted to see French opera replaced by the new Italian comic opera.
“The charm of these light operas,” says Mary Hargrave in her little
book, The Earlier French Musicians, “lay in the simplicity of their
subjects, taken from scenes and persons in ordinary life, humorously
treated. They came as a delightful relief after the stilted classical
heroes and heroines, the threadbare episodes of gods and goddesses,
the Greek and Roman warriors in tunics, with ribbons and helmets
on powdered wigs, in short, all the artificial conventions of which
people had at last grown unutterably weary.”
Even the court was divided: Louis XV was on the side of French
music, but the Queen was for the Italian, and crowds gathered
nightly at the opera near the royal boxes, which were known as the
“King’s corner,” and the “Queen’s corner.” Word bombshells were
thrown from one camp into the other, and sometimes these became
real insults! Poor Rameau! First he was the butt of the Lullyists
because he was too modern, and now storms of abuse were heaped
on his head because he was too old-fashioned! Nevertheless, to the
end of his life his operas were received with great enthusiasm, and
on one occasion when the old man of eighty was seen hiding in the
corner of a box during one of his operas, he was called out with
storms of applause. He was always very shy about appearing in
public, applause embarrassed him, and no doubt much of his
disagreeableness was due to his being bashful.
Rameau looked upon his scientific studies as more important than
his composing, and Bach, Handel and many other composers studied
his theory work even when they were not great admirers of his
compositions. We never hear his operas, but his lovely pieces for the
harpsichord, many of which are out of his operas, are played in piano
recitals and are unsurpassed as examples of the French dance suite.
Following the fashion of his time, he gave his pieces amusing titles
such as The Call of the Birds, The Hen, The Whirlwinds, The
Egyptian.
A list of his works show that he wrote 26 operas, 2 cantatas, 5
books on theory, and 4 volumes of harpsichord music.
His death occurred in 1764, and all France mourned their “greatest
composer” and for years held memorial services in his honor.
Piron, a French writer, said of him: “All his mind and all his soul
were in his harpsichord and when he had closed that, the house was
empty, there was no one at home.”
 French Composers for Clavecin and Harpsichord

In every collection of French instrumental music of the 17th and

18th centuries, besides the names of Lully and Rameau, we find
Jacques Champion de Chambonnières (1600–1670), Jean Baptiste
Loeilly, or Loeillet (?–1728?), François Couperin (1668–1733), Jean
François Dandrieu (1684–1740), Jean Louis Marchand (1669–1733),
Louis Claude Daquin (1694–1772) and Schobert (1720–1768).
These writers for clavecin and harpsichord of the French school
were the first to write music for instruments to which they gave
names describing the nature of the compositions. So, now, in
addition to the names of dances which formed the suites, we find The
Coucou, Butterflies, Tambourine, The Windmill, The Turtle-Doves,
and so on. This was an important step for it led directly to the kind of
titles given to piano pieces in the 19th century by the German
romantic school.
The most important of this group was François Couperin, called
“the great,” as he was the most gifted member of a family, who
supplied France with musicians for two centuries. From 1665 to
1826, there were eight Couperins who were organists of St. Gervais’
Church in Paris.
We can compare the Couperin family to the Bachs who flourished
at the same time in Germany. François (1668–1733), was only a year
old when his father died, but a friend, who was an organist, taught
him and in time he, too, became organist at St. Gervais. He was
harpsichord player to the King, and was a favorite in court circles. No
fashionable affair was complete without Couperin at the harpsichord,
and every Sunday evening he played chamber music for Louis XIV,
the royal patron of Lully. One of the books of pieces for the clavecin
was published under the title of Royal Concerts, and in the preface,
Couperin told that they were written for “les petits concerts du roi”
(the little concerts of the king), and he also said that he hoped the
public would like the pieces as much as the King did. For twenty
years Couperin played in the King’s household, and taught several
princes and princesses.
 You know the old proverb, “All roads lead to Rome.” We would
change it, and say that all roads lead to Bach! And Couperin is one of
the main highways, for without knowing that he was doing so, he
prepared the way for Bach, Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven.
Everything he wrote, and most of his pieces were in the dance form
of the suite, was exquisite in refinement and taste. The French
musicians of today look upon him as one of their composers, most
truly French, and they try to follow in the way he led, so as to be able
to write music that will express the French people, in heart and
character. Later in the story of music, the German classic school and
then the romantic school had a very strong influence on the music of
every country in the world, and in France there was the desire to
brush aside the outside influences, and to find the road that the early
French composers of the 17th and 18th centuries had traveled. Paul
Landormy, a French writer on musical history has summed up
Couperin as “one of the miracles of the French spirit in music, and
across the gulf of time he clasps hands on one side with Jannequin
and Costeley (p. 437), on the other with Fauré and Debussy” (p. 416).
All the important music outside of opera written in France at this
time was for the clavecin and harpsichord, and if the flute or the viol
was invited to take part in a concert, it was only to double the melody
played by the harpsichord, and did not have a part especially created
for it.
Wouldn’t you be surprised today if you should see an
announcement of a concert to be given by the President’s chauffeurs?
But in the time of Couperin and Lully wind instruments were used in
all the court festivals, balls and ballets, and were played by men
attached to the great hunting stables of the king. The band was called
la musique de la grande écurie du Roi (music of the King’s stables).
There were twelve trumpets, eight fifes and drums, the cromornes
(krumhorn—a curved reed instrument), four to six Poitou oboes and
bagpipes, and twelve large oboes under which title were included
violins, oboes, sackbuts and cornets. These players of wind
instruments accompanied the royal hunting parties and made the
beautiful forests of France ring with their merry music. Each family
had its own hunting call, by which it was recognized from afar. We
heard a phonograph record in Paris of these ancient calls, and with
each one, the name of the family to whom it belonged was
announced.
By the way, do you know the difference between a band and an
orchestra? (This is not a conundrum!) A band was originally a group
of musicians who played while standing or marching, while the
orchestra was always seated. This word comes from the Greek word
meaning dance, and was first given to a group of players who
accompanied the dancers in the dramas, and were seated in that
section of the theatre which is still called the orchestra.
 CHAPTER XVII
Germany Enters—Organs, Organists and Organ Works

It is rather hard to believe that the largest of all instruments, the pipe
organ, is a descendant of Pan’s Pipes, played by the shepherds on the
hillsides of ancient Greece, is it not? The pipes of the church organ of
today are of different lengths and are built on the same principle as
were the pipes of Pan, our goat-footed friend, who broke off the reeds
by the bank of a stream way back when the world was young, to pour
out his grief in music for his lost love, Syrinx.
The next step was to supply the organ pipes with wind so they
could be made to produce tones without blowing on each one
separately. A wooden box was invented, and each pipe inserted into a
hole in the top of the box, which is still called the wind-chest. At first
this was supplied with air by two attendants who blew into tubes
attached to the wind-chest. Soon the tubes were replaced by bellows,
and were worked with the arms, and as the instrument grew larger,
with the feet like in a treadmill. An organ is spoken of in the Talmud
as having stood in the Temple of Jerusalem, and the hydraulic
(water) organ in which air was supplied to the pipes by means of
water power was built in Alexandria, Egypt, about the year 250 B.C.
The small organ with keys that could be carried from place to place
was called a portative (from the Latin porto—to carry); the larger
organ sometimes stationary and sometimes moved on wheels was
called a positive. The levers needed to produce the sound were soon
exchanged for keyboards which at first had only a few keys, and you
may remember our telling how the keys were pounded with the fists
and elbows, in the Winchester organ.
A Greek writer of the 4th century A.D. gives us a vivid description of
an organ: “I see a strange sort of reeds—they must methinks have
sprung from no earthly, but a brazen soil. Wild are they, nor does the
breath of man stir them, but a blast, leaping forth from a cavern of
oxhide, passes within, beneath the roots of the polished reeds.”
It is not known just when the organ was first used in the churches,
but there are records of its having been known in Spanish churches
as early as the 5th century A.D. Pope Vitalian introduced it in Rome in
666, and in the 8th century in England, organ-building became a
very popular profession. Cecil Forsyth says: “In those days a monk or
bishop who wished to stand well with society could not take up
essay-writing or social-welfare: what he could do was to lay hands on
all the available timber, metal, and leather, and start organ-
building.”
Pepin, the father of Charlemagne, imported an organ into
Compiègne, France, from Byzantium in the 8th century.
Charlemagne had it copied at Aix-la-Chapelle. The Arabians must
have been organ-builders, too, for one of their most famous rulers,
Haroun-al-Raschid, sent Charlemagne a pneumatic organ noted for
its soft tone. The instruments made in Germany and France up to the
10th century were small and unpretending, but were objects of
astonishment and curiosity.
In Magdeburg, in the 11th century, we find the first keyboard with
keys 3 inches broad. In 1120, we hear of an organ in the Netherlands
that had 2 manuals (keyboards) and pedals. Organ-building was
growing up! In the 14th century the manuals of many organs had 31
keys.
The organ was not always accepted in the church, for in the 13th
century its use was regarded as scandalous just as the English
Puritans in the 17th century called it a “squeaking abomination,” and
it is not even now admitted in the Greek Catholic Church!
Until the 14th century, the organ had been used only in a most
primitive way to guide the singers of plain-song. It became a solo
instrument when it was possible to grade its tone from soft to loud,
which was done by the invention and use of three manuals: the upper
one played “full organ” (very loud); the middle, the discant (softest),
played a counterpoint to the subject; the subject was played on the
lowest keyboard.
So we see how one invention led to another until the organ became
an instrument of almost unlimited possibilities, and how keyed
instruments had shown the composers how to develop music along
new lines. By the end of the 16th century, organ compositions and
organ-playing had made rapid progress all over Europe, and you will
recall the great organists in all the churches and cathedrals in the
Netherlands, in England, Italy, France, Spain, and even in Germany
which up to this time had not been on the “musical map.” (Chapter
XI).
Are you wondering why we have gone back into “ancient history”
at this point, or have you already discovered that these grand old
organists are leading us directly Bach-ward?
 Frescobaldi

Just a century before Bach’s time, the greatest of all Italian

organists, Girolamo Frescobaldi (1583–1644), was born at Ferrara,
Italy. So popular was he, that he filled the vast Cathedral of St.
Peter’s, whenever he played. His compositions were the most
important produced for organ in the early 17th century, and his
fugues were the first to be treated in modern fashion, in form, fancy,
and feeling for tone color, and were a foundation on which Bach’s
were built. His compositions include canzones, toccatas, ricercari,
and numerous pieces in the popular dance forms. Most of these are
found in two collections published for cembalo e organo (spinet and
organ). He was not interested in opera, but went his own musical
way expressing himself in an original and individual language far
ahead of his period. With Frescobaldi, Italy ceased to be the world’s
center for organists.
 German Organists

At this point, Germany came into the musical field, and soon
became the artistic center of organ-playing. Up to this time, the
country had produced less music than any of its neighbors: Italy had
written the greatest Church music, and invented opera; France had
followed closely in Italy’s footsteps; the Low Countries had helped in
music’s growth by their early work in polyphony and had taught all
Europe including Germany; England had led the world in her
compositions for virginals and harpsichord, the forerunners of piano
music. Although Germany did not at first rank musically with these
countries, the religious fervor and devotion to the cause of
Protestantism bore fruit in the grand chorales of Luther. In these we
find the birth of German music destined to rule the world for two
centuries, the 18th and the 19th, just as the Italian had in the 16th
and the 17th. The religious inspiration, the direct simplicity and
sincerity of the chorales are the qualities found in the works of the
first great German composer, Johann Sebastian Bach!
The religious wars of the first half of the 17th century crushed
almost all the music out of Germany. In the second half, the
organists became the leaders, and their music for organ inspired by
the chorale was the first real contribution that Germany made to the
growth of music.
One of the earliest of these German organists was Johann Jacob
Froberger (1605–1667), of Saxony, who was a pupil of Frescobaldi,
and court organist at Vienna. He went to London (1662), and as he
was robbed on the way, he arrived penniless. He found work as
organ-blower at Westminster Abbey. On the occasion of Charles II’s
marriage, he overblew the bellows and interrupted the playing,
which so enraged the organist Christopher Gibbons, son of Orlando,
that he struck him. Poor Froberger! But he had a chance to redeem
himself, for he sat down to the organ a few moments later, and
started to improvise in a manner for which he was famous in Vienna.
A former pupil of his, recognizing his style, was overjoyed to find
him, and presented him to the King. He was invited to play on the
harpsichord which he did to the astonishment of every one.
 A Dutch organist, Johann Adam Reinken (1623–1722) and a Dane,
Dietrich Buxtehude (1637–1707) belong to this school, as they lived
in Germany most of their lives and worked along the lines the
Germans were developing. Reinken was a pupil of Frescobaldi; he
had a direct influence on Bach who often walked from Lüneburg to
Hamburg to hear the far-famed organist. When Reinken was 99
years old he heard Bach improvise on his Chorale “By the Waters of
Babylon,” which drew from him the praise, “I thought that this art
was dead, but I see that it still lives in you.”
 Absolute Music

It is very probable that had Buxtehude not lived, Bach would have
written his organ works in a different style, so deeply did the younger
composer study the older man’s compositions. Buxtehude was
organist in Lüneburg and there he started a series of concerts which
became so popular that they were continued into the 19th century.
Bach walked fifty miles to hear Buxtehude play, but was too shy to
make himself known to the great man; it was probably to hear one of
the concerts which had the poetic name of Abendmusik (Evening
Music), that he went. Buxtehude was one of the first to try to make
instrumental music stand as music (a language in itself), without a
dance form, a plain-song or chorale or poetic idea behind it, to act as
a Biblical text does in a sermon. This music for music’s sake is called
“Absolute Music” and Bach was one of its strongest disciples.
Absolute music, which was so beautifully handled by Buxtehude,
became the basis of the Classic School of the 18th and early 19th
centuries.
The organ chorale prelude which was so important a musical form
during this period had a very interesting history. Today the organist
in our churches plays the hymn through before it is sung; he plays it
quite simply just as it is written in the Hymnal, but in the day of
these old German organists, the artistic feeling was deeper, and the
organist was allowed to weave the chorale or hymn into a beautiful
and complete composition. But in his love of composing and of
showing how many different ways he could decorate the chorale, he
often exceeded his time limit, and the chorale prelude was left
behind. In its place the organ fantasia and the sonata appeared.
Johann Pachelbel (1653–1706), of Nüremberg, was a pupil of
another celebrated director and organist, Johann Kaspar Kerl (1628–
1693), who was said to be one of the best teachers of composition of
his day. There were also three German organists born late in the 16th
century, all of whom were followers of the famous Dutch composer
Jan Sweelinck. They were known as the “three S’s”—Heinrich Schütz
was the greatest of them. He wrote organ music, but also worked out
a scheme for combining the chorale with the ideas of Peri and
Caccini for use with Bible texts in the Lutheran Church. This was
called Passion music and was originally written for Good Friday. On
this foundation Bach built some of his grandest oratorios. The Italian
influence came into Schütz’s work while he was a pupil of Gabrieli in
Venice. Johann Heinrich Schein was a Cantor at St. Thomas’ School
before Bach, and wrote many chorales. The third of the “three S’s”
was Samuel Scheidt who was called the German Frescobaldi. “What
plain-song was to Palestrina and his school, the chorale was to
Schütz and his followers.” (Quoted from Charles Villiers Stanford.)
 The Inventor of the Sonata and of “Program Music”

Johann Kuhnau (1660–1722), wrote many compositions which

today we find very amusing! For his day, however, he must have been
looked upon as ultra-modern! The composition which first brought
him into public notice was a motet, written for the election of the
town council. Could you imagine anyone writing a serious
composition for an election today, or anyone willing to listen to it at
the polls? He was organist of St. Thomas’, in Leipsic, a graduated
lawyer, master of several languages, writer of satirical poems,
musical director of the University, and finally Cantor in two
Churches. He was admired and honored after his death as one of the
greatest musicians of his day and one of the most learned men. He
invented a style of music for the clavier which he called Sonata. It
was in several movements and was not based on dance tunes as were
the suites. While it was not in the form that later was known as
sonata-form, it was a sign-post pointing the way. Seven of these
sonatas he named Fresh Clavier Fruit! And it was fresh in style as
well as in name.
He was the first German composer to write “program music,” that
is the kind which tries to tell a story, or to imitate the actual sounds
of natural objects, such as the crash of thunder, the motion of a
windmill, the rocking of a cradle, and the cackling of a hen. You can
see how long a list one might make and how easy it would be for
anyone with a vivid imagination to make up all sorts of pictures in
music. This is just the opposite from music for music’s sake which we
described to you as “Absolute Music,” and most of it which follows
this period when music comes of age can be put into one of the two
camps,—the Program Music Camp, or the Absolute Music Camp.
Kuhnau’s program music took a queer turn! He was living at a
time when religion was uppermost in every one’s thoughts, when the
Bible stories were bedtime stories and when the leading
compositions were the sonatas written for organ. So in 1700 he
published six Biblical-history Sonatas. In David and Goliath, he
attempts to put into music the rude defiance and bravado of the
giant; the fear of the Hebrews; David’s courage and fearlessness, and
the battle and fall of the giant; the flight of the Philistines (can’t you
imagine how the composer would represent this with all kinds of
runs and scales?); the joy of the Hebrews; the celebration of the
women who probably came out to meet David “with timbrels and
harps”; and general jubilation.
At the end of the 17th century, Germany was strongly under the
influence of France and Italy, especially in opera. In Dresden, Berlin,
Munich and Vienna, one heard only opera in Italian sung by Italian
singers, but Hamburg tried to develop a national music by giving
German opera sung by German singers, and attracted many serious
musicians. Johann Mattheson (1681–1764) a singer, conductor and
composer, is remembered chiefly for a book called A German Roll of
Honor, in which he gathered up all the information he could find
about German composers up to his time. He asked all the living
composers to write accounts of themselves for his book, so we take it
for granted that it must be truthful!
Music had changed more in the 17th century than in any that had
gone before. If we tried to sum it all up in one word we should say
that it was a century of transition or the passage from one condition
to another. It began with the old Ecclesiastical, or Church, modes,
and ended with the major and minor scales which we still use today;
the reign of counterpoint was over, and now had to share the throne
on equal terms with harmony.
 Sonata-Form

The dominating musical form after Bach’s time was to be the

Sonata, a name we have often used. The sonata which found its
champions in Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven, was the child of the
sonata written by D. Scarlatti, Kuhnau, and Bach and his sons. It is
built on the principle of contrast as were the suites. A sonata is a
collection of three or four related pieces called movements: one, fast
—one, slow—then fast. If in four movements, the first is moderately
fast; the second, very slow; the third, fast (scherzo); the fourth fast
(usually rondo form).
Sonata-form is the name given to the first movement of a sonata, a
string quartet, trio, quintet, etc., concerto or a symphony. It has two
main themes which are announced, then developed and then re-
announced, forming three contrasting sections or panels: Statement
or Exposition, Development, and Restatement. From now on, when
we speak of sonata-form, this picture should come to you.
The stage is now all set for Bach and those who came after him.