"Basso" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... best room to the official and his aide-de-camp, but unfortunately the inquirer did not improve the situation by persisting in the foolish belief that the foreigner was hard of hearing. He shouted his request into my ear in a stentorian basso, he waved his hands, he pointed, he made signs. The Chinese langage and manner, however, are difficult to an addle-pated foreigner. I, poor foolish fellow, endeavoring to treat the Chinese in a manner identical to that which he would have employed had ...
— Across China on Foot • Edwin Dingle
... numbers admitted, in all probability, would be trebled, on which hypothesis a calculation may be based. What an exercise it would be for the imagination of the audience, were the Statue Scene from Don Giovanni to be given with the Basso Profondo in evening dress, who represents the Stony Commendatore, seated astride a plank resting on tressels placed on a table which would have been substituted for the stone pedestal, while the Don ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, February 11, 1893 • Various
... was facing the deer, his head down, blowing the dust in twin clouds before him, hooking the dirt over his back in regular righting bull fashion, and anon saying, "Bh-ur-ur-ooor!" in an adolescent basso-profundo, most ridiculously broken by streaks of soprano. When these shrill notes occurred the little bull rolled his eyes around, as much as to say "Who did that?" and we, swinging our legs on the shed roof, laughed gleefully and encouraged him to ...
— Red Saunders' Pets and Other Critters • Henry Wallace Phillips
... the spirit, and argued of fate, free-will, foreknowledge absolute, wandering through eternity without lighting on any fresh discovery of importance in that extensive field—Fan not infrequently found herself taking part in a somewhat monotonous trio, with the Captain, baritone, or basso rather, for he was rather depressed in mind, and Tom, tenor, an artist who sang with feeling, but with insufficient control over ...
— Fan • Henry Harford
... deserve a passing mention because, notwithstanding a certain rigidity of structure, they have been used by the great masters for the expression of sublime thoughts. These are the Ground Bass (or, as it is sometimes called, the Basso Ostinato), the Chaconne and the Passacaglia[82] which, in modern literature, is well represented by the magnificent "tour de force" that serves as the Finale to Brahms's Fourth Symphony. By a Ground Bass is ...
— Music: An Art and a Language • Walter Raymond Spalding
... height, and are also of mingled orders. In the western tower is the great bell, nineteen feet high, named Santa Maria de Guadalupe. We know of nothing of the sort exceeding it in size and weight except the great Russian bell to be seen in the square of the Kremlin at Moscow. The basso-relievos, statues, friezes, and capitals of the facade of the great edifice are of white marble, which time has rendered harmonious with the gray stone. Though millions of dollars have been lavishly expended upon ...
— Aztec Land • Maturin M. Ballou
... Mostrava la ruina e'l crudo scempio Che fe'Tamiri quando disse a Ciro Sangue sitisti, ed io di sangue t'empio. Mostrava come in rotta si fuggiro Gli Assiri poi che fu morto Oloferne, Ed anche le reliquie del martiro. Vedeva Troja in cenere e in caverne: O Ilion, come te basso e vile Mostrava il segno che li si discerne! Qual di pennel fu maestro o di stile, Che ritraesse l'ombre e gli atti ch'ivi Mirar farieno uno'ngegno sottile? Morti li morti, e i vivi parean ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 118, August, 1867 • Various
... to the chagrin and embarrassment of the male rustics who had left their manners at home. The story forms a melodramatic stage-setting which the mummers have not been slow to use, representing the seven daughters as a ballet, the shepherds as a male chorus, and Moses as basso-profundo and hero. We are told that the girls went home and told their father of the chivalrous stranger they had met, and he, with all the deference of the desert, sent for him "that he ...
— Little Journeys To The Homes Of Great Teachers • Elbert Hubbard
... to soothe the bass down, but they couldn't. He looked like a great pouter pigeon, strutting about the room, and then he got red, and I thought he looked like an angry turkey cock. The secretary of the society came in, and the basso attacked ...
— Between You and Me • Sir Harry Lauder
... which it did when Cleofonte grew weary, Hermia brought forth her orchestre and played for them; first the tunes she had practiced and afterward, as she gained new confidence in their appreciation, "Santa Lucia" and "Funiculi, funicula," to which Cleofonte, who had a soul for concord, roared a fine basso. It was a night for vagabonds, carefree, a night of laughter, of mirth and of song. What did it matter what happened on the morrow? Here were meat, drink and good company. Could ...
— Madcap • George Gibbs
... church Corinne pointed out to Nelville Ovid's Metamorphoses, which were represented on the gates in basso-relievo. "We are not scandalised in Rome," said she to him, "with the images of Paganism when they have been consecrated by the fine arts. The wonders of genius always make a religious impression on ...
— Corinne, Volume 1 (of 2) - Or Italy • Mme de Stael
... on hearing the guttural salutation. It was Captain Hegermann, the commander of the ship, a big florid Saxon with great bushy golden whiskers and a basso voice like Edouard de Reszke. He was imposing in his smart uniform and gold braid and his manner had the self-reliant, authoritative air usual in men who have great responsibilities and are accustomed to ...
— The Lion and The Mouse - A Story Of American Life • Charles Klein
... the rifles and the basso profundo of the guns, it was a scene of ordered, yes, almost peaceful industry which in no way suggested war but reminded me, rather, of the Panama Canal at the busiest period of its construction (I have used the simile before, but I use it ...
— Italy at War and the Allies in the West • E. Alexander Powell
... 'Till anger seizes him I wait!' created laughter; it came in contrast with an extraordinary pomposity of self-satisfaction exhibited by Count Orso—the flower-faced, tun-bellied basso, Lebruno. It was irresistible. He stood swollen out like a morning cock. To make it further telling, he took off his yellow bonnet with a black-gloved hand, and thumped the significant colours prominently on his immense chest—an idea, not of Agostino's, but Lebruno's ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... Giuglini in their prime, and Grisi, Mario, Sontag and Persiani with voices but a little the worse for wear, can sadly contrast the vocal glories of the past with those of the present. Who are the great singers of to-day? Two or three prime donne and as many baritones. There is not a single basso living to suggest Lablache, not a tenor to revive the triumphs of Rubini, Mario, Giuglini or the subject of the ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, October, 1880 • Various
... to become the bride, then, of the Count of Campo-basso, the unworthy favourite of Charles?" said Quentin, who had been told the reason why refuge had been ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VIII • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... Maccaferri, and a fresh, universally admired baritone, Gassier; and there is our old buffo friend, Rocco, and many more. Besides whom are two famous announcements, yet to come from Europe: the French tenor, Roger, and the German basso, Formes. The orchestra and chorus are, we suppose, as usual; the conductor better; he is Herr Anschtz, who has had experience in London, and who subdues his orchestra to sympathetic support of the singers. With Max it is the other way; he loves to ride full swing upon the top of his forces, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I, No. 1, Nov. 1857 • Various
... side, like aisles. He was disposed to give the origin of them, as well as of those in the harbor of Bombay, to a period prior to the Christian era. However strange and historically interesting these excavated temples may be to the observant traveler, he will look in vain among the carvings and basso-relievi for any just proportions of form or expression of features. There is a lack of anything like artistic genius evinced, no correctness of anatomical proportions even attempted. The figures doubtless were sufficiently typical to answer ...
— Due West - or Round the World in Ten Months • Maturin Murray Ballou
... resonance; ring &c. v.; ringing, tintinabulation &c. v.; reflexion[Brit], reflection, reverberation; echo, reecho; zap, zot[coll.]; buzz (hiss) 409. low note, base note, bass note, flat note, grave note, deep note; bass; basso, basso profondo[It]; baritone, barytone[obs3]; contralto. [device to cause resonance] echo chamber, resonator. [ringing in the ears] tinnitus[Med]. [devices which make a resonating sound] bell, doorbell, buzzer; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... as follows: The manager is frequently one of the most wealthy and considerable persons of the little town he inhabits. He forms a company consisting of prima donna, tenoro, basso cantante, basso buffo, a second female singer, and a third basso. The libretto, or poem, purchased for sixty or eighty francs from some lucky son of the muses, who is generally a half-starved abbe, the hanger-on of some rich family in the neighborhood. The character of the parasite, so admirably ...
— Great Italian and French Composers • George T. Ferris
... sketch of the action, Wagner is above all an actor. The first thing that occurs to him is a scene which is certain to produce a strong effect, a real actio,(10) with a basso-relievo of attitudes; an overwhelming scene, this he now proceeds to elaborate more deeply, and out of it he draws his characters. The whole of what remains to be done follows of itself, fully in keeping with a technical economy which has no reason to be subtle. ...
— The Case Of Wagner, Nietzsche Contra Wagner, and Selected Aphorisms. • Friedrich Nietzsche.
... principal temple are made of metal, and the door posts of ivory. On the first are the most beautiful arabesques in basso-relief, and on the second, in inlaid work, representing flowers and other objects. Before the principal entrance, four of the largest elephant's teeth ever found are stuck up by ...
— A Woman's Journey Round the World • Ida Pfeiffer
... The cafe, Basso and Bregaillon, has a "vue splendide" (in the daytime), so the bill says. What you see at night is a well lit quay with the cafe lights shining out across the dark water in the dock on to some white steam yachts. After getting rid of a uniformed ...
— From Edinburgh to India & Burmah • William G. Burn Murdoch
... the Court orchestra, and Court organist in Altenburg (born 1817); he was a friend of Liszt's for many years.] most warmly for his friendly intention to play one of my Organ pieces. He will probably choose either the Variations on the Basso continuo of Bach's Cantata "Weinen, sorgen, seufzen, klagen" ("Weeping, grieving, sighing, lamenting")—or ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 2: "From Rome to the End" • Franz Liszt; letters collected by La Mara and translated
... especially the Basso Profundos, will be glad to know that Dickens pays more attention to them than to the other voices, though it must be acknowledged that the references are of a humorous nature. 'Bass!' as the young gentleman ...
— Charles Dickens and Music • James T. Lightwood
... G.C.M. A great poet? received with acclamation G.C.M. A great painter? oh! certainly, G.C.M. If a great painter, why not a great novelist? Well, pass, great novelist, G.C.M. But if a poetic, a pictorial, a story-telling or music-composing artist, why not a singing artist? Why not a basso-profondo? Why not a primo tenore? And if a singer, why should not a ballet-dancer come bounding on the stage with his cordon, and cut capers to the music of a row of decorated fiddlers? A chemist puts in his claim ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... morning a storm, driving out of the east, enveloped the coast in a frigid, lashing rain. The wind mounted steadily through the middle of the day with an increasing pitch accompanied by the basso of the racing seas. The bay grew opaque and seamed with white scars. After the meridian the rain ceased, but the wind maintained its volume, clamoring beneath a ...
— Wild Oranges • Joseph Hergesheimer
... stolle gia dell' altro polo Vedea la notte, e il nostro tanto basso Che non sorgeva fuor del ...
— Impressions of South Africa • James Bryce
... A real! Only one real! Ladies' and gents' hosiery at a real a pair! Look-a-here now! A real a pair!" Then, lowering his register, he would continue, gravely: "A nice Bayonne waistcoat. A splendid bargain!" And as a finale, he would add in a basso profundo: "Only ...
— The Quest • Pio Baroja
... e piu l'esser di sasso; Mentre che 'l danno e la vergogna dura Non veder, non sentir m'e gran ventura; Pero non mi destar; deh! parla basso! ...
— Michael Angelo Buonarroti • Charles Holroyd
... campus years T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., had gayly pursued the even tenor (or basso, since he possessed a foghorn, subterranean voice) of his Bannister career. He absolutely refused to take life seriously, and he was forever arousing the wrath—mostly pretended, for no one could be really angry with the genial youth—of his comrades, by twanging ...
— T. Haviland Hicks Senior • J. Raymond Elderdice
... his hat, and breathing heavily and hoarsely said in a friendly basso, like an old acquaintance, giving ...
— Mother • Maxim Gorky
... is moving very fast; for all the boys are running;—the pattering of bare feet upon the pavement sounds like a heavy shower.... Then the chanting grows fainter in distance; the Devil's immense basso becomes inaudible;—one only distinguishes at regular intervals the crescendo of the burden,— a wild swelling of many hundred boy-voices all rising together,— a retreating storm of rhythmic song, wafted to the ear in gusts, ...
— Two Years in the French West Indies • Lafcadio Hearn
... this neighbourhood, adorned with a couple of columns of Touchstone, and two beautiful spherical plates of Alabaster.] At the other end of the corridore, there is a range of antient sepulchral stones ornamented with basso-relievo brought hither from different parts by the Pisan Fleets in the course of their expeditions. I was struck with the figure of a woman lying dead on a tomb-stone, covered with a piece of thin drapery, so delicately cut as to shew all the flexures of the attitude, and even ...
— Travels Through France and Italy • Tobias Smollett
... sort of singing,) I can make no more of it than that the fleshy man you call the tenor, and who you say is no scaly fellow, but a man with whom several damsels have become enamored, is outdoing the big man you call the basso, in telling his troubles to the audience, who, I take it, care not a whit about them, seeing that most of them are keeping up a loud conversation on matters concerning their neighbors, which is a proof of their resolution not to let the bawling ...
— The Life and Adventures of Maj. Roger Sherman Potter • "Pheleg Van Trusedale"
... Temple be raised, with its white-marbled columns, sacred to the memory of this ILLUSTRIOUS NOBLEMAN! Let his bust, in basso-relievo, with appropriate embellishments, adorn the most conspicuous compartment within: and peace and virtue, and filial affection, will, I am sure, be the guardians of so cherished ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... Vischer and his five sons, which still stands in all its beauty in the elegant church dedicated to the saint. The shrine encloses, amid the most florid Gothic architecture, the oaken chest encased with silver plates, containing the body of the venerated saint; this rests on an altar decorated with basso-relievos, depicting his miracles.[231-[]] The architectural portion of this exquisite shrine partakes of the characteristics of the Renaissance forms engrafted on the mediaeval, by the influence of Italian art. Indeed, ...
— Rambles of an Archaeologist Among Old Books and in Old Places • Frederick William Fairholt
... petition, its suspicions having been excited by the fact that when you discovered your domestic tragedy, you sought to behave like a civilized person, with pity and self-restraint, instead of like a sultan in Turkey, or a basso in an Italian ...
— The Profits of Religion, Fifth Edition • Upton Sinclair
... Morat he re-entered Lorraine, at the head of an army, not composed of his faithful militia of the Netherlands, but of those mercenaries in whom it was madness to place trust. The reinforcements meant to be despatched to him by those provinces were kept back by the artifices of the count of Campo Basso, an Italian who commanded his cavalry, and who only gained his confidence basely to betray it. Rene, duke of Lorraine, at the head of the confederate forces, offered battle to Charles under the walls of Nancy; and the night before the combat ...
— Holland - The History of the Netherlands • Thomas Colley Grattan
... mormorio assai soave, e basso, Che ogniun che l'ode lo fa addornientare, L'acqua, ch'io dissi gia per entro un sasso E parea che dicesse nel sonare. Vatti riposa, ormai sei stanco, e lasso, E gli augeletti, che s'udian cantare, Ne la dolce armonia par che ogn'un dica, Deh vien, e dormi ...
— Flowers and Flower-Gardens • David Lester Richardson
... but after passing the bridge at Gournay, the soft somnolence of digestion had sealed his eyes. The horses understood the coachman's plight from the slackness of the reins; they heard the footman's basso continuo from his perch behind; they saw that they were masters of the situation, and took advantage of their few minutes' freedom to make their own pace. Like intelligent slaves, they gave highway robbers the chance of plundering one of the richest capitalists in France, the most deeply cunning ...
— Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac
... them create such vivid impressions that the shades of dead monks seem to rise and pass before the hearer in solemn and gloomy funereal pomp." The work needs no programme. Its serene beginning, lugubrious interlude, with the dominant pedal never ceasing, a basso ostinato, gives color to Kleczynski's contention that the prelude in B minor is a mere sketch of the idea fully elaborated in No. 15. "The foundation of the picture is the drops of rain falling at regular intervals"—the echo principle again—"which by their continual ...
— Chopin: The Man and His Music • James Huneker
... Love-goddesses, and they are sporting with his weapons. He stretches out his arm towards the Goddess, who looks upon him with fond glances. Cupids are spreading out a draping." That is Pesne's luxurious performance in the ceiling.—"Weapon-festoons, in basso-relievo, gilt, adorn the walls of this room; and two Pictures, also by Pesne, which represent, in life size, the late King and Queen [our good friends Friedrich Wilhelm and his Sophie], are worthy of attention. Over each of ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. X. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—At Reinsberg—1736-1740 • Thomas Carlyle
... celebrated Mithras with a serpent coiled round him, between the folds of which are sculptured the signs of the zodiac; Medea and her children; a mile-stone, bearing the names of the Emperors Theodosius and Valentinian; a basso-relievo of the Muses; several sarcophagi, votive altars, cornices, pillars, mutilated statues, and inscriptions, are here carefully preserved: but nothing in the collection equals the statue known by the title of the Venus of Arles, ...
— The Idler in France • Marguerite Gardiner
... Tressan translated the words "capo basso'' (low headland) in a passage from Ariosto by "Cap de Capo Basso,'' on account of which translation the wits insisted upon calling him ...
— Literary Blunders • Henry B. Wheatley
... the greatest of which occur on a meridional line east of the eastern trough. The eastern depression, known as the East African trough or rift-valley, contains much smaller lakes, many of them brackish and without outlet, the only one comparable to those of the western trough being Lake Rudolf or Basso Norok. At no great distance east of this rift-valley are Kilimanjaro—with its two peaks Kibo and Mawenzi, the former 19,321 ft., and the culminating point of the whole continent—and Kenya (17,007 ft.). Hardly less important is the Ruwenzori ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... The very Cuts are worth the Money; there being, inter alia, above 300 curious Heads of Learned Authors, on large Copper-Plates, engraven by Mr. Herman van Stynkenvaart, from the Paintings, Busto's, and Basso-Relievo's ...
— A Learned Dissertation on Dumpling (1726) • Anonymous
... rattling panels, in spite of every effort to make them fast, rattled the more. One night when the servants were alone in the house, of its own volition the organ sent forth, to break the still hours, a blood-curdling basso-profundo groan that suggested ghosts to their superstitious minds. The housemaid came to regard the instrument as something uncanny, and, even as the cook had done before her, shook the dust of the house ...
— The Booming of Acre Hill - And Other Reminiscences of Urban and Suburban Life • John Kendrick Bangs
... external resemblance, I take it the Germans were not the first men to perceive. A foreign friend once pointed it out to me, in the skeleton of a foe he had slain, and with the vertebrae of which he was inlaying, in a sort of basso-relievo, the beaked prow of his canoe. Now, I consider that the phrenologists have omitted an important thing in not pushing their investigations from the cerebellum through the spinal canal. For I believe that much of a man's character will be found betokened ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... with an idle word!" O mariner, I love thee, for thy thought Strides even with my own, nay, flies before. Thou art a brother to the wind and wave; Have they not music for thine ear as mine, When the wild tempest makes thy ship his lyre, Smiting a cavernous basso from the shrouds And climbing up his gamut through the stays, Through buntlines, bowlines, ratlines, till it shrills An alto keener than the locust sings, And all the great Aeolian orchestra Storms out its mad sonata in the gale? Is not the ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... church, and returned with a doubtful allegiance to Ebenezer. He joined the singing-class there, for his voice had suddenly grown harsh and deep, and he conceived himself to be a basso. The parish swarmed with vocal celebrities, and he would be one of them. He made his first visit to the class, and ...
— Despair's Last Journey • David Christie Murray
... further step from monochrome to polychrome; we have the distinct trio, the golden yellow in the sky, the blue in the sea, and the red in the figures in the boats,—as in a vocal trio we have the only three possible musical sounds of the human voice, the soprano, the basso, and the falsetto of the child's voice. All these colors are distinctly asserted and perfectly harmonized in a most exquisite play of tints, but it is still no more like Nature than the trio in "I Puritani" is like conversation. Turner ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 4, February, 1858 • Various
... sounding basso in the thick air and the Merchant answered. The Explorer made his way toward him, thrusting violently at the coarse stalks that barred ...
— Youth • Isaac Asimov
... second Porter dashed up, in a frenzy of terror. When he found Derby safe, his fright turned to rage, and he was impatient to put the prisoner into the hands of the carabinieri. "Our friend Basso will make short work of him, I'm thinking!" ...
— The Title Market • Emily Post
... rivers was fed by a hundred springs situated in the midst of charming bowers. The monks called it the San Antonio; and on its banks they built three noble Missions. The shining white stone of the neighborhood rose in graceful domes and spires above the green trees. Sculptures, basso-relievos, and lines of gorgeous coloring adorned the exteriors. Within, were splendid altars and the appealing charms of incense, fine vestures and fine music; while from the belfreys, bells sweet and resonant ...
— Remember the Alamo • Amelia E. Barr
... which had no legitimate or hereditary succession. The names of the Pope's nephews were Lionardo, Giuliano, and Giovanni della Rovere, the three sons of his brother Raffaello; Pietro and Girolamo Riario, the two sons of his sister Jolanda; and Girolamo, the son of another sister married to Giovanni Basso. With the notable exception of Giuliano della Rovere,[3] these young men had no claim to distinction beyond good looks and a certain martial spirit which ill suited with the ecclesiastical dignities thrust upon some of them. Lionardo was made prefect of Rome and ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volume 1 (of 7) • John Addington Symonds |
