"Recitative" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... in the same boat," resumed the Doctor in the deep tones which somehow sounded like bass recitative; "the Rector, Colonel Russell, and I—not to say Carey himself. We all wished to increase our incomes with as little trouble and risk as possible—so it seemed then, but if the bank comes to smash, all the old Redcross gentle-folks, as we were ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler
... First, Angele. She may be twenty-five, but is more probably fifteen. She acts as Adjutant to Madame, and rivals her mother as deliverer of sustained and rapid recitative. She milks the cows, feeds the pigs, and dragoons her young brothers and sisters. But though she works from morning till night, she has always time for a smiling salutation to all ranks. She also speaks ...
— All In It K(1) Carries On - A Continuation of the First Hundred Thousand • John Hay Beith (AKA: Ian Hay)
... lips, and Zoe thought he was faint; but the next moment he put his handkerchief hastily to his nose, and wriggled his way out, with a rush and a crawl, strangely combined, at the very moment when the singer delivered her first commanding note of recitative. ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... was being opened the women sat down among the flat tombstones, bordered with a pale fringe of early bracken, and began the wild keen, or crying for the dead. Each old woman, as she took her turn in the leading recitative, seemed possessed for the moment with a profound ecstasy of grief, swaying to and fro, and bending her forehead to the stone before her, while she called out to the dead with a ...
— The Aran Islands • John M. Synge
... art, must look for analogies to painting and the like; but in what is technical and executive, being a temporal art, it must seek for them in music. Each phrase of each sentence, like an air or a recitative in music, should be so artfully compounded out of long and short, out of accented and unaccented, as to gratify the sensual ear. And of this the ear is the sole judge. It is impossible to lay down laws. Even in our accentual and rhythmic language no analysis can find the secret ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 16 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... it. The artists who draw those cozy little pictures of a brooding mother bird, with the male perched but a yard away in full song, do not copy from nature. The thrasher's nest I found was thirty or forty rods from the point where the male was wont to indulge in his brilliant recitative. It was in an open field under a low ground-juniper. My dog disturbed the sitting bird as I was passing near. The nest could be seen only by lifting up and parting away the branches. All the arts of concealment had been carefully studied. It was the last place you would think of looking ...
— Bird Stories from Burroughs - Sketches of Bird Life Taken from the Works of John Burroughs • John Burroughs
... Rinuiccini abandoned the form of the canzone which had hitherto been used in the lyrical part of the drama, and adopted the Pindaric ode. Many poets followed in the same path; more action was given to the dramatic parts, and greater variety to the music, in which the airs were agreeably blended with the recitative duets; other harmonized pieces were also added, and after the lapse of a century Apostolo Zeno (1669-1750) still further improved the melodrama. But it was the spirit of Metastasio that breathed a soul of fire into this ingenious and happy form ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta
... men—first a man of the tribe of Aaron the High Priest, then a Levite, and then five ordinary Israelites—were called up to the platform to stand by while the Scroll was being intoned, and their arrivals and departures broke the monotony of the recitative. After the Law came the Prophets, which revived the child's interest, for they had another and a quainter melody, in the minor mode, full of half tones and delicious sadness that ended in a peal of exultation. For the Prophets, though they thundered against the iniquities of ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... after being trimmed, alone by water to Erith, all the way with my song book singing of Mr. Lawes's long recitative song in the beginning of his book. Being come there, on board my Lord Bruncker, I find Captain Cocke and other company, the lady not well, and mighty merry we were; Sir Edmund Pooly being very merry, and a right English gentleman, and one of the discontented Cavaliers, that think their ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... moment when Valentine goes to him and that when she conceals herself in the chamber at the side, a quarter of an hour does not elapse; while formerly, according to the traditions of the Quiquendone theatre, this recitative of thirty-seven bars was wont to last ...
— A Winter Amid the Ice - and Other Thrilling Stories • Jules Verne
... out, one of the older Hebrews in the forward ranks began to sing, in a wild recitative chant, of Canaan and the freedom of Israel. The elders in the line near him took it up and every face in the long column lighted and was lifted in silent concord with the singers. Atsu in his chariot, close by, scanned his lists ...
— The Yoke - A Romance of the Days when the Lord Redeemed the Children - of Israel from the Bondage of Egypt • Elizabeth Miller
... and a coaxing kind of recitative it is, after all. Don't tell me of your soft Etruscan, your plethoric. Hoch-Deutsch, your flattering French. To woo and win the girl of your heart, give me a rich brogue and the least taste in life of blarney! There's nothing like it, believe ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 2 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... the race from which they derive their characteristics should serve as a general explanation of their purport. The second, twelfth and fourteenth rhapsodies are admirable examples of the series. In general these "Hungarian Rhapsodies" open with a few brief bars suggestive of tragic recitative, which leads into a broad yet strongly marked and searching rhythm, upon which is built a slow, stately yet mournful melody, broken in upon here and there by strange weird runs and rapid passages. These latter serve a double purpose. They imitate the curious aeolian harp effects of ...
— The Pianolist - A Guide for Pianola Players • Gustav Kobb
... I clambered down to the cottage by Moraine Lake. The next morning, in addition to the birds already observed in the valley, I listened to the theme-like recitative of a warbling vireo, and also watched a sandpiper teetering about the edge of the water, while a red-shafted flicker dashed across the lake to a pine tree on the opposite side. As I left this attractive valley, the hermit thrushes seemed to ...
— Birds of the Rockies • Leander Sylvester Keyser
... in a way that not only destroys the singing tone but also the organ that produces it. The truth of this cannot be gainsaid. There is a considerable amount of vocal wreckage strewn along the way, the result of wrestling with Wagnerian recitative. Wagnerian singers are, as a rule, vocally shorter lived than those that confine themselves to French and ...
— The Head Voice and Other Problems - Practical Talks on Singing • D. A. Clippinger
... instance practised with a view to a livelihood, or at any rate not directly so, this branch of it was not regarded by public opinion with such disfavour as writing for the stage: towards the end of this epoch one or two Romans of quality had publicly come forward in this manner as poets.(51) Recitative poetry however was chiefly cultivated by those poets who occupied themselves with writing for the stage, and the former held a subordinate place as compared with the latter; in fact, a public to which read poetry might ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... Bible, the example of Ossian, Blake, and many another European experimenter during the Romantic epoch, Whitman really succeeded in elaborating a mode of poetical expression, nearer for the most part to recitative than to aria, yet neither pure declamation nor pure song: a unique embodiment of passionate feeling, a veritable "neutral zone," which refuses to let itself be annexed to either "prose" or "verse" as those terms are ordinarily understood, but for which "free verse" is precisely the right expression. ...
— A Study of Poetry • Bliss Perry
... The recitative stopped; there was a murmur of mingled voices, and footsteps. A girl parted the curtains which hung between the rooms and came toward him. Her hair was black, fastened by long pins of bone; her face white and resentful; her brows were straight and dark, and the eyes beneath ...
— Nicanor - Teller of Tales - A Story of Roman Britain • C. Bryson Taylor
... you remember sweet Alers Ben Bolt?" began Susy, in the same breath and the wrong key. "Sweet Alers, with hair so brown, who wept with delight when you giv'd her a smile, and—" with knitted brows and appealing recitative, "what's er ...
— A Waif of the Plains • Bret Harte
... as I could get my breath from this extraordinary shower bath; "what's all this?" My wife came running towards the cow yard, as I stood with the milk streaming from my hair, filling my eyes, and dropping from the tip of my nose; and she and Biddy performed a recitative lamentation over me in alternate strophes, like the chorus in a Greek tragedy. Such was our first morning's experience; but as we had announced our bargain with some considerable flourish of trumpets among our neighbors and friends, we concluded ...
— Household Papers and Stories • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... fare which his master conjures up before him. But we others who, in books as in music, desire above all to find substance, and who are scarcely satisfied with the mere representation of a banquet, are much worse off. In plain English, Wagner does not give us enough to masticate. His recitative—very little meat, more bones, and plenty of broth—I christened "alla genovese": I had no intention of flattering the Genoese with this remark, but rather the older recitativo, the recitativo ...
— The Case Of Wagner, Nietzsche Contra Wagner, and Selected Aphorisms. • Friedrich Nietzsche.
... all recognize a common grievance, the dull murmurs of the people become cries of impatience. Rossini has proceeded on this hypothesis. After the outcry in C major, Pharoah sings his grand recitative: Mano ultrice di un Dio (Avenging hand of God), after which the original subject is repeated with more vehement expression. All Egypt appeals ...
— Massimilla Doni • Honore de Balzac
... to Margaret. And as he sat before the piano, demipatient and wholly joyful, his fingers twinkled the yellowed and black keys into fits of merriment, or, after an abrupt pause, built heap upon heap of bass chords. Then the mood would change and, to a whanging accompaniment, he would chant, recitative fashion, the three poems which ...
— Aladdin O'Brien • Gouverneur Morris
... by some writer (who it is I cannot now remember) when he criticises the wood thrush for spending too much time in tuning his instrument. But the fault is the critic's, I think; to my ear these preliminaries sound rather like the recitative which goes before ...
— Birds in the Bush • Bradford Torrey
... were given in Madame Deshoulieres' inimitable recitative, the party had come close to the rustic pair. "People may well say," muttered Madeleine, "that the pictures of Nature are always best at a distance. Can it be possible that this is a shepherdess—a shepherdess of Lignon?" The shepherdess was ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - April 1843 • Various
... songs detached themselves, with their music, from the main work, and lingered in choral or solo service in places where the sacred operetta was presented, both in America and England. One of these is an effective solo in deep contralto, with a suggestion of recitative and chant— ...
— The Story of the Hymns and Tunes • Theron Brown and Hezekiah Butterworth
... "Lyric Declamation: Recitative, Song and Ballad Singing," will be discussed the practical application of these basic principles of Style to the vocal music of the German, French, Italian ...
— Style in Singing • W. E. Haslam
... adequately to describe it. It arose in part, no doubt, from the sentiment of love with which I was imbued; but chiefly from my conviction of the extreme sensibility of the singer. It is beyond the reach of art to endow either air or recitative with more impassioned expression than was hers. Her utterance of the romance in Otello—the tone with which she gave the words "Sul mio sasso," in the Capuletti—is ringing in my memory yet. Her lower tones were absolutely miraculous. Her voice embraced three ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 3 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... at Sabre, but straight across the top of his head and began an appalling, and as it seemed to Sabre, an endless recitative. "The Colonel's killed. Bruce ...
— If Winter Comes • A.S.M. Hutchinson
... distance from one another, such an arrangement would appear to put an end to anything like social intercourse or conversation; but they have invented a means of overcoming this difficulty by making a species of chant, or recitative, their customary mode of address to each other. In an encampment at night the young men recount to one another their love adventures and stories; and the old men quarrel with their wives or play with their ...
— Journals Of Two Expeditions Of Discovery In North-West And Western Australia, Vol. 2 (of 2) • George Grey
... original music, dealing in harmony rather than in tune, and there are motives, of course all in the minor key, which might be utilized by advanced peoples; these sons of nature would especially supply material for that recitative which Verdi first made something better than a vehicle for dialogue. Hence the old missioners are divided in opinion; whilst some find the sound of the "little guitar," with strings of palm-thread and played ...
— Two Trips to Gorilla Land and the Cataracts of the Congo Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... of harps in the still air of autumn. The verses seem as if played to the ear upon some unseen instrument. And the poet's manner of reciting verse is similar. It is not rhetorical, but musical: so very near recitative, that for any one else to attempt it would be ridiculous; and yet it is perfectly miraculous with what exquisite searching he elicits and makes sensible every particle of the meaning, not leaving a shadow of a shade of the feeling, the mood, the degree, untouched. ...
— Famous Reviews • Editor: R. Brimley Johnson
... tweedledum and tweedledee, band, orchestra; concerted piece [Fr.], potpourri, capriccio. vocal music, vocalism^; chaunt, chant; psalm, psalmody; hymn; song &c (poem) 597; canticle, canzonet^, cantata, bravura, lay, ballad, ditty, carol, pastoral, recitative, recitativo^, solfeggio^. Lydian measures; slow music, slow movement; adagio &c adv.; minuet; siren strains, soft music, lullaby; dump; dirge &c (lament) 839; pibroch^; martial music, march; dance music; waltz &c (dance) 840. solo, duet, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... some deep, sad, occult mystery, the singers began in a rapid, sweet recitative: "With Thy blessed saints in glory everlasting, the soul of this Thy servant save, set at rest; preserving her in the blessed life, as Thou ...
— Yama (The Pit) • Alexandra Kuprin
... one profoundly. They only sing when the mood takes them; never with a view to please others, but always simply to give vent to their emotions. Their love-songs generally open with a sentimental recitative, and then change into actual singing, with frequent modulations from one key into another. The time is irregular, and though certain rhythmical peculiarities recur constantly, yet each performer ...
— In the Forbidden Land • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... through life the role of sham attendant on sham sensations, and play public celebrant of other women's loves and lovers, singing, or rather saying, nothing more enlivening than: "Oh, madame!" and "Ah, madame!" and "Quelle ivresse!" or "Quelle horreur!" or, in recitative, detailing whatever dreary platitudes and inanities the librettist and Heaven connive to put upon the tongues of ...
— Balcony Stories • Grace E. King
... He stood at one end of the fire-bed and poised the wooden tray over his head, and then sprinkled a handful of it on the ground before the glowing bed of coals. At the same time another priest who stood by him chanted a weird recitative of invocation and struck sparks from flint and steel which he held in his hands. This same process was repeated by both the priests at the other end, at the two ...
— The Miracle Mongers, an Expos • Harry Houdini
... sweet and sorrowful, she repeated the story which each had told her, running them into a continuous recitative. The old woman rose from the floor, and joining in the chant in a quavering croon, sprinkled salt at the thresholds of the doors and at the feet of every person, ending by throwing a large handful up the chimney. It fell back and sputtered and ...
— Shapes that Haunt the Dusk • Various
... arrived at that conjectural solution of his perplexities when a voice was heard singing, or rather modulated to that kind of chant between recitative and song, which is so pleasingly effective where the intonations are pure and musical. They were so in this instance, and Kenelm's ear caught every word in the ...
— Kenelm Chillingly, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... degree for a pantomime marquis, who is no other than Miss MADGE TITHERADGE stepping down from the "legitimate" and bringing an air and an elocution unusual and admirable. She made her excellent speaking voice do duty in recitative for song, and the innovation is not unpleasing. If it be fair in frivolous public places to dig down to those thoughts that better lie too deep for tears, Mr. ALFRED NOYES' A Song of England, clear spoken by her with ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, January 3, 1917 • Various
... like a lion," she went on, in a more even recitative, "and the second is like an ox, and the third has a face like a man, and the fourth is like a flying eagle. An' they're sittin' on ilka bedpost; and they hae sax wings, that meet owre my Gracie, an' they cry withoot ceasing, 'Holy! holy! holy! Woe unto him that ...
— Bog-Myrtle and Peat - Tales Chiefly Of Galloway Gathered From The Years 1889 To 1895 • S.R. Crockett
... of the court inquired, in a sort of chant or recitative, whether the prisoner had anything to say why judgment should not be given in accordance ...
— Foul Play • Charles Reade
... as the recitative duet began in which Gilbert lays bare his abominable machinations to his master Ashton, Charles, seeing the false troth-ring that is to deceive Lucie, thought it was a love-gift sent by Edgar. He confessed, moreover, that he did not understand the story because of the music, which interfered very ...
— Madame Bovary • Gustave Flaubert
... Somehow or other the recitative gentleman's hat turned over to the wind, and that active body (which never neglects any sportive opportunity) got into the crown, with the speed of an upstart, and made off with it along the stones. ...
— Springhaven - A Tale of the Great War • R. D. Blackmore
... counterpoint of the phrase, "and believe the glad tidings of God," is a masterpiece of contrapuntal writing, and, if performed by a choir of three or four hundred voices, would produce an overpowering effect. The divine call of Simon Peter and his brethren is next described in a tenor recitative; and the acceptance of the glad tidings is expressed in an aria, "The spirit of the Lord is upon me," which, by an original but appropriate conception, is given to the soprano voice. In the next number, the disciples are dramatically represented ...
— The Unseen World and Other Essays • John Fiske
... pauses of Sorrow and respite from sorrow long drawn out, the sharp ache of Sin, the glimpses of unhallowed Joy, the strain of upward Endeavor, the serene peace of Faith and Love, crowned by the blessed Vision of the Grail. 'Tis past. The prelude melts into the opening recitative. ...
— Parsifal - Story and Analysis of Wagner's Great Opera • H. R. Haweis
... women, the gay shirts and bandanas of the men, the brilliant wreaths of natural flowers which adorn both, the hot-house temperature, the new trees and flowers which demand attention, the strange rich odours, and the low monotonous recitative which mourns through the groves make me feel that I am in a new world. Ah, this is all Polynesian! This must be the land to which the "timid-eyed" lotos-eaters came. There is a strange fascination in the languid air, and it is strangely ...
— The Hawaiian Archipelago • Isabella L. Bird
... the charming recitative of Herr Tuden Links, to the infant, which is really one of the most ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume V. (of X.) • Various
... traditional form of Jewish prayer. About their devotional exercises Halevy says: "From the holy precincts the prayers of the faithful rise aloft to heaven. From midnight on, we hear the clear, rhythmical, melancholy intonation of the precentor, the congregation responding in a monotonous recitative. Praise of the Eternal, salvation of Israel, love of Zion, hope of a happy future for all mankind—these form the burden of their prayers, calling forth sighs and tears, exclamations of hope and joy. Break of day still finds the ...
— Jewish Literature and Other Essays • Gustav Karpeles
... fine, manly voice, of great richness and depth, was soon heard, singing to an accompaniment on the same instrument. The air was grave, and altogether unusual for the social character of one who dwelt upon the ocean, being chiefly in recitative. The words, as near as might ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper
... notes of a Gregorian chant introducing the recitative note; usually sung without the organ, by one of the Clergy or choir who is called ...
— The American Church Dictionary and Cyclopedia • William James Miller
... driving it into the earth; no man can be a consummate husbandman who does not know how to sing to his oxen, and that is an art that requires taste and especial gifts. To tell the truth, this chant is only a recitative, broken off and taken up at pleasure. Its irregular form and its intonations that violate all the rules of musical art make it impossible ...
— The Devil's Pool • George Sand
... characteristic progressions and cadences, is a striking feature of the Bach fugue. His "Suites" exalted forever the familiar dance tunes of the German people. His wonderful "Chromatic Fantasia and Fugue" ushered the recitative into purely ...
— For Every Music Lover - A Series of Practical Essays on Music • Aubertine Woodward Moore
... any other nation, ranging as they do over all manner of subjects. They are generally heroical or amorous in character, divided into short verses and sung in two parts; the bass delivers a kind of recitative, and the baritone joins in, the long final note with which each finishes dying away in a full chord. It is extraordinary how serious the men are over it, even when singing over their wine, in which they ...
— The Shores of the Adriatic - The Austrian Side, The Kuestenlande, Istria, and Dalmatia • F. Hamilton Jackson
... is given, his brother tunes his violin to accompany him, and he begins to rehearse in recitative, with wonderful fluency and precision. Thus he will, at a minute's warning, recite two or three hundred verses, well turned, and well adapted, and generally mingled with an elegant compliment to the company. The Italians are so fond of poetry, that many of them, have the best part of Ariosto, ...
— Travels Through France and Italy • Tobias Smollett
... you, and perhaps even for me if I begin to think I'm boring you. Couldn't we do something desperate—dine at a Latin Quarter restaurant for instance? What was that place you were telling me of, where the waiter has a wonderful voice and makes the orders he shouts down the tube sound like the recitative of ...
— The Incomplete Amorist • E. Nesbit
... in Italy. I have the pleasure of hearing him frequently, and think the purity of his taste at least equal to the perfection of his voice; rare praise for a singer in these "most brisk and giddy-paced times." He gave us last night the beautiful recitative which introduces ...
— The Diary of an Ennuyee • Anna Brownell Jameson
... proved in Griffith Gaunt's case. The Rev. William Wentworth published, in the usual recitative, the banns of marriage between Thomas Leicester, of the parish of Marylebone in London, and Mercy Vint, spinster, of this parish; and creation, present ex hypothesi mediaevale, but absent in fact, assented, by silence, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 105, July 1866 • Various
... as a recitative, both in English and Italian,—In questa tomba. He seemed to bring out a hidden force in his singing, which was not apparent on ordinary occasions. His reading of poetry was also fine, but he depended in it rather too much on his voice, ...
— Cambridge Sketches • Frank Preston Stearns
... The latter work is the more worthy of remark, not because of its music, but because of the fulsomely obsequious manner in which it celebrates the graces and virtues of Nicolaus the Magnificent. The cantata is made up of choruses and duets, a recitative and two arias. Parts of it were afterwards employed in church services. The Te Deum is in C major, and is for four voices with orchestra. It is interesting as an early work, especially if we compare it with the greater Te Deum in the same key ...
— Haydn • J. Cuthbert Hadden
... and Hartel (to reward me for my abstemiousness, Weinlich induced them to publish this poor composition). From that moment he gave me a free hand. To begin with I was allowed to compose a Fantasia for the pianoforte (in F sharp minor) which I wrote in a quite informal style by treating the melody in recitative form; this gave me intense satisfaction because it won me praise ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner
... and of its large white teeth; and while she sang Miss Buckston had jerked her head rhythmically to one side and beaten time with her hand as if to encourage and direct her less competent companions. Sometimes, now, she looked almost as funny, when she sat down to the piano and gave forth a recitative. ...
— Franklin Kane • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... continuous sound, and knew that the stream which intersected the park on its way to the river had been freed from ice by the January thaw, and was pouring its swollen waters over the dam. The note was deep and full, like a solemn recitative, as if Nature's diurnal harmonies had sunk to this one transitional key. Above all, the mildness of the air, full of the alluring witchery of a false spring, affected the imagination like a ...
— The Mayor of Warwick • Herbert M. Hopkins
... on the Lieder of Schumann and Franz. That is to say, they are written with a high poetical feeling inspired by the verses they sing, and, while melodious enough to justify them as lyrics, yet are near enough to impassioned recitative to do justice to the words on which they are built. Nevin is also an enthusiastic devotee of the position these masters, after Schubert, took on the question of the accompaniment. This is no longer a slavish thumping of a few chords, ...
— Contemporary American Composers • Rupert Hughes
... heard the fine trills of the field sparrows; the swinging chant of the creeping warblers and the loud rattle of the Tennessee warblers ran high up in the scale, furnishing a gossamer tenor; that golden optimist, the Baltimore oriole, piped his cheery recitative in the tops of the trees; chickadees supplied the minor strains and tufted titmice the alto; four or five turtle doves soothed the ear with their meditative cooing; while the calls and songs of numerous jays and a few ...
— Our Bird Comrades • Leander S. (Leander Sylvester) Keyser
... tints that extinguished the flames, a low murmur became audible, swelling and rising upon the air, until the thunder-throated organ filled all the cloistered recesses with responsive echoes of Rossini. Some masterly hand played the "Recitative" of Eia Mater, bringing out the bass with powerful emphasis, and concluding with the full strains of the chorus; then the organ-tones sank into solemn minor chords indescribably plaintive, and after a while a quartette ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... The recitative is an affront to common sense, and if there be any spectacle more than another opposed to the genius of the English character and unsuited to its taste it is the ballet of the opera house. Its eternal dumbshow, with its fantastic appeals to sense and ...
— Chapters of Opera • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... brown-haired Olaf! Olaf of the merry eye—Olaf, the pride of the Norse maiden?" She lifted herself in a more erect attitude, and stretching out her lean arms, went on as though chanting a monotonous recitative. "Olaf, the wanderer over wild seas,—he comes and goes in his ship that sails like a white bird on the sparkling waters—long and silent are the days of his absence—mournful are the Fjelds and Fjords without the ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... under my window, and I've never heard him do it before in all his five years. It was the dearest old-fashioned tune ever written and Billy sang the words as distinctly as if he had been a boy chorister doing a difficult recitative. My heart beat so it shook the lace on my breast like a breeze from heaven as he took the high note and then let it go ...
— The Melting of Molly • Maria Thompson Daviess
... hands, but shed not a tear—"speed, Hugh," she said, "speed, speed, husband of my heart—the arms of God are they not open for you, and why do you stay?" These sentiments, we should have informed our readers, were uttered, or rather chaunted in a recitative of sorrow, in Irish; Irish being the language in which the peasantry who happen to speak both it and English, always express themselves when more than usually excited. "The sacred oil of salvation is upon you—the sacrament of peace and forgiveness ...
— Valentine M'Clutchy, The Irish Agent - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton
... copiously otherwise: your Bonaparte represents his Sorrows of Napoleon Opera, in an all-too stupendous style; with music of cannon-volleys, and murder-shrieks of a world; his stage-lights are the fires of Conflagration; his rhyme and recitative are the tramp of embattled Hosts and the sound of falling Cities.—Happier is he who, like our Clothes-Philosopher, can write such matter, since it must be written, on the insensible Earth, with his shoe-soles only; and also ...
— Sartor Resartus - The Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdrockh • Thomas Carlyle
... gave Piccini her protection. Gluck, armed with German theories and supporting French music, maintained for dramatic interest, the subordination of music to poetry, the union or close relation of song and recitative; whereas, the Italian opera represented by Piccini had no dramatic unity, no great ensembles, nothing but short airs, detached, without connection—no substance, but mere ornamentation. Gluck proved, also, ...
— Women of Modern France - Woman In All Ages And In All Countries • Hugo P. Thieme
... had hunted up everybody who could fiddle and blow for the rehearsal. He was proud to show what good musicians the town possessed; but everything seemed to go perversely wrong. Lauretta set to work at a fine scene; but very soon in the recitative the orchestra was all at sixes and sevens, not one of them had any idea of accompaniment Lauretta screamed—raved—wept with impatience and anger. The organist was presiding at the piano; she attacked him with the bitterest ...
— Weird Tales. Vol. I • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... published. The Indian Queen and Bonduca stand badly in need of careful editing—not in the spirit of one editor of King Arthur who, while declaring that he had altered nothing, stated that he had altered some passages to make them sound better. The Indian Queen contains the recitative "Ye twice ten hundred deities" and the song "By the ...
— Purcell • John F. Runciman
... (or were, for one has taken his Last Degree) eight musical quills, there was but one pair of lips which could claim any special consecration to vocal melody. Not that one that should undervalue the half-recitative of doubtful barytones, or the brilliant escapades of slightly unmanageable falsettos, or the concentrated efforts of the proprietors of two or three effective notes, who may be observed lying in wait for them, and coming down on them with all their ...
— The Poet at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... a church choir, and so he led the singing; Parsons had a serviceable bellow, which roared and faded and roared again very wonderfully; Mr. Polly's share was an extraordinary lowing noise, a sort of flat recitative which he called "singing seconds." They would have sung catches if they had known how to do it, but as it was they sang melancholy music hall songs about dying soldiers and the old ...
— The History of Mr. Polly • H. G. Wells
... with strong poetical sensitiveness. His work is even more poetical than musical. The suppression of the lyrical element, and therefore of melody, is with him a systematic parti pris. No more duos or trios; monologue and the aria are alike done away with. There remains only declamation, the recitative, and the choruses. In order to avoid the conventional in singing, Wagner falls into another convention,—that of not singing at all. He subordinates the voice to articulate speech, and for fear lest the muse should take flight he clips her wings; so that his works are rather symphonic ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner
... warning, a horse cantered up to the side door, and Molly Delawarr's voice in its loudest tones (and very loud they were) demanded where all those stupid creatures were who ought to be there to take her horse. Then Miss Molly, having been helped off, came marching in, and greeted her friends with a recitative— ...
— The Maidens' Lodge - None of Self and All of Thee, (In the Reign of Queen Anne) • Emily Sarah Holt
... they contained some matter of scandal to those good people, who could more easily dispossess their lawful sovereign, than endure a wanton jest, he was forced to turn his thoughts another way, and to introduce the examples of moral virtue, writ in verse, and performed in recitative music. The original of this music, and of the scenes which adorned his work, he had from the Italian operas; but he heightened his characters, as I may probably imagine, from the example of Corneille and some French poets. ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Volume 4 (of 18) - Almanzor And Almahide, Marriage-a-la-Mode, The Assignation • John Dryden
... recitative, the style, moreover, least subject to precise laws, that Delsarte used this license; and it was in this style that he ...
— Delsarte System of Oratory • Various
... a third element exists: an accompaniment of eighths in uniform succession without any significance beyond that of filling out the harmony. This third element is to be kept wholly subordinate. The little, one-voiced introduction in recitative style which precedes the aria reminds one vividly of the beginning of the Ballade ...
— Chopin: The Man and His Music • James Huneker
... Chamber, or private, Musick; where the Multitude is not courted for Applause, but only the true Judges; and consists chiefly in Cantata's, Duetto's, &c. In the Recitative of Cantata's, our Author excelled in a singular Manner for the ...
— Observations on the Florid Song - or Sentiments on the Ancient and Modern Singers • Pier Francesco Tosi
... Banjos and "dulcimores" came out of hiding and sounded plaintively over the waste of waters. Scraps of almost mediaeval life showed out in thumb-nail sketches between the sooty shadow world and the red flare of the bonfires. Voices were lifted into weird minors and lugubrious tunes, recitative, of sad love themes—and these were, of course, addressed to Alexander. She joined no group, but sat with her hands clasped about her updrawn knees and her gaze ranging off into distance. The carmine and orange illumination played upon her color of cheek and hair and eyes and when, ...
— A Pagan of the Hills • Charles Neville Buck
... receded about six inches, and through them, accompanied by Robin, the Inspector clove his way to the encampment, where Dicky, who seemed to be rapidly losing his head, was delivering a sort of recitative to every one in general, accompanied by ...
— The Right Stuff - Some Episodes in the Career of a North Briton • Ian Hay
... this is sung is a kind of droning recitative, depending much on expression and feeling. To read it, it may, perhaps, seem humorous; but it is that humour which is near akin to pathos, and to those who have seen the distress it describes it is a powerfully pathetic song. Margaret ...
— Mary Barton • Elizabeth Gaskell
... days. The organ of St. Merry had a pitch in B flat. In addition to the tempi and the different instruments which make the execution difficult, one must add the recitatives which were very much employed and of which at that time a serious study was made. I recall a beautiful example of recitative in the ...
— On the Execution of Music, and Principally of Ancient Music • Camille Saint-Saens
... regularly spaced beats, the size and general characteristics of the group depending upon the number and position of the accents in each measure. There exists, however, a certain amount of non-measured vocal music, and a word concerning the most common varieties (recitative and Anglican chant) will perhaps be in order before closing our discussion of ...
— Essentials in Conducting • Karl Wilson Gehrkens
... to the garden, bringing her affianced lover, Don Ottavio, whom she had called to the help of her father. She finds the Commandant dead, and breaks into agonizing cries and tears. Only an accompanied recitative, but every ejaculation a cry of nature! Gounod is wrought up to an ecstasy by Mozart's declamation and harmonies. He suspends his analysis to ...
— A Book of Operas - Their Histories, Their Plots, and Their Music • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... burst of laughter rang out. The girl spoke in too recitative a way, having repeated her story so many times already that she knew it by heart. The doctor's remark was sure to produce an effect, and she herself laughed at it in advance, certain as she was that the others would laugh also. However, she still ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... the Creole, "listen to a song of my country; we do not know how to make verses; we muse a simple recitative, without rhyme, and at each pause we improvise a couplet appropriate to the subject; it is very pastoral; it will please you, I am sure, master. This song is called the 'Loving Girl!' it is ...
— Mysteries of Paris, V3 • Eugene Sue
... oratorio after another followed the 'Messiah,' none of them entitled to rank with that great work for either loftiness of subject or grandeur of expression, yet many containing passages of unrivalled beauty. 'Jephtha,' which was the last oratorio he composed, contains the magnificent recitative, 'Deeper and deeper still,' and the beautiful song, 'Waft her, angels.' It was while writing 'Jephtha' that Handel became blind, but, though greatly affected by this loss, it did not daunt his courage or lessen his ...
— Story-Lives of Great Musicians • Francis Jameson Rowbotham
... only by the monotonous and murmured chant of a Gaelic song, sung in a kind of low recitative by the steersman, and by the dash of the oars, which the notes seemed to regulate, as they dipped to them in cadence. The light, which they now approached more nearly, assumed a broader, redder, and more irregular splendour. It appeared plainly to ...
— Waverley • Sir Walter Scott
... leisure hours, including the greater portion of their lives, with the repetition of songs which are, for the most part, proverbs illustrated, or figures of speech applied to the occurrences of life. Some that they rehearse, in a kind of recitative, at their bimbangs or feasts, are historical love tales like our old English ballads, and are often extemporaneous productions. An example of the former species is ...
— The History of Sumatra - Containing An Account Of The Government, Laws, Customs And - Manners Of The Native Inhabitants • William Marsden
... there appeared in the streets of Glamerton a man carrying in his hand a bundle of papers as a sample of what he had in the pack upon his shoulders. He bore a burden of wrath. They were all hymns and ballads of a minacious description, now one and now another of which he kept repeating in lugubrious recitative. Amongst them some of Watts's, quite unknown to Glamerton worshippers, carried the palm of horror. But there were others which equalled them in absurdity, although their most ludicrous portions affected the ...
— Alec Forbes of Howglen • George MacDonald
... anything be more revolting than this sing- song recitation of tragic woes? The actor is a mouthpiece: that is his sole responsibility;—the poet has seen to the rest, ages since. From an Andromache or a Hecuba, one can endure recitative: but when Heracles himself comes upon the stage, and so far forgets himself, and the respect due to the lion-skin and club that he carries, as to deliver a solo, no reasonable person can deny that such a performance is in execrable taste. Then again, your objection to dancing—that ...
— Works, V2 • Lucian of Samosata
... through to the real kitchen beyond. When he had finished his beautiful theme on "The March of the men of Harlech," he changed the measure again to "Tri chant o' bunnan" (Three hundred pounds), and immediately a most unmusical-looking man began chanting "Pennillion," or a sort of recitative stanzas, which were soon taken up by another, and this amusement lasted so long that Owen grew weary, and was thinking of retreating from his post by the door, when some little bustle was occasioned, on the opposite side of the room, ...
— The Doom of the Griffiths • Elizabeth Gaskell
... "Flower Maidens" was, of course, irresistible—little cries, meaningless by themselves, but, when brought together, they created an enchanted garden, marvellous and seductive. But it was the duet that followed that compelled his admiration. Music hardly ever more than a recitative, hardly ever breaking into an air, and yet so beautiful! There the notes merely served to lift the words, to impregnate them with more terrible and subtle meaning; and the subdued harmonies enfolded them in an atmosphere, a sensual mood; and in this music we sink into depths of ...
— Evelyn Innes • George Moore
... as the grub turns in due season into the winged plague who buzzes and fly-blows—the little reciting bore turns into the dramatic or theatric acting, reading, singing, recitative—and finally into the ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. IX - [Contents: Harrington; Thoughts on Bores; Ormond] • Maria Edgeworth
... unintelligible. Among the early Greeks, for many centuries, the several characters of poet, musician, lawgiver, and philosopher, were combined in the same individual; and it is probable that the music of that period consisted principally of recitative or musical declamation. This species of composition, so utterly neglected and unknown to the English school, possesses great powers of expression, both when in its simple form and when accompanied. A modern example of the effects it is ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... knew the latest operas, and loved the spirit of unrest, the unsettled minor chords of the new school of music; preferred the leit motif to the aria, music drama to opera, and was altogether exceedingly modern in her tastes. She did not like recitative in music, and preferred Wagner and Tschaikowsky to Bach and Verdi. She loved to be stirred up, she said. She liked Beethoven, yes, but he was too mathematical. As for Handel, he was uninteresting in the extreme; and so she went ...
— The Music Master - Novelized from the Play • Charles Klein
... bidden lay out herbs!" sang the gaoler in amateur recitative. "Mistress Maude hath no shepherd's pouch! Mistress Maude is loth to go ...
— The White Rose of Langley - A Story of the Olden Time • Emily Sarah Holt
... wilfully to misstate the matter. Let me repeat my conviction (Terminal Essay, 144-145) that The Nights, in its present condition, was intended as a text or handbook for the Rawi or professional story-teller, who would declaim the recitative in quasi-conversational tones, would intone the Saj'a and would chant the metrical portions to the twanging of the Rababah or one-stringed viol. The Reviewer declares that the original has many such passages; but why ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... approximated by debbil,—which is, indeed, a favorite reference, both with the men and with his Reverence. But the chaplain, peacefully awaiting, gently repeated his text after the chant, and to my great relief the old chorister waived all further recitative and ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 86, December, 1864 • Various
... horse; I hear the Spanish dance, with castanets, in the chestnut shade, to the rebeck and guitar; I hear continual echoes from the Thames; I hear fierce French liberty songs; I hear of the Italian boat-sculler the musical recitative of old poems; I hear the Virginian plantation chorus of negroes, of a harvest night, in the glare of pine-knots; I hear the strong barytone of the 'long-shore-men of Mannahatta; I hear the stevedores unlading the cargoes, and singing; I hear the screams of the water-fowl of solitary north-west ...
— Poems By Walt Whitman • Walt Whitman
... another chapter, in which we have a series of recitative-like phrases, the most of which end upon diminished chords and contain or suggest enharmonic modulations of extreme modern type. The recitatives are very expressive, and their proper delivery necessitates a high degree of musical sensitiveness ...
— The Masters and their Music - A series of illustrative programs with biographical, - esthetical, and critical annotations • W. S. B. Mathews
... farces and the singers of Roast Beef(779) from between the acts at both theatres, with a man with one note in his voice, and a girl without ever an one; and so they sing, and make brave hallelujahs; and the good company encore the recitative, if it happens to have any cadence like what they call a tune. I was much diverted the other night at the opera; two gentlewoman sat before my sister, and not knowing her, discoursed at their ease. Says one, "Lord! ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole
... sculpture, or engraving; thus the fine arts cannot exist among them. They have no music but vocal; and know of no accompaniment except a bass of one note like that of the bagpipe. Their singing is in a great measure recitative, with little variation of note. They have scarcely any notion of medicine or surgery; and they do not allow of anatomy. As to science, the telescope, the microscope, the electric battery, are unknown, except as playthings. The compass is not universally employed in their ...
— Historical Sketches, Volume I (of 3) • John Henry Newman
... preluding passage on the piano, then Adelade's glorious voice pronounced that stirring recitative, 'O Patria.' This was the passage alluded to by the young dandies in the caff. I laid down my book, and leaned forward to listen. The recitative over, then followed that delicious 'hymn of youth and love,' as Scudo calls it, 'Tu che accendi' followed ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... example, could be more animated, and at the same time more expressive of the thought conveyed in the verse than the following chorus?—the introduction to which is a sort of recitative ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 2, August, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... know the feeling—the climaxes, exceptions, surprises, suspensions, in which harmony delights; the change from the last bar of the overture to the first of the opening recitative in the "Messiah," the chord upon which the victor is crowned in "The Meistersingers," the 59th and 60th bars in Handel's "Every Valley." (I hope some of us are "old-fashioned" enough to be unashamed of ...
— Stained Glass Work - A text-book for students and workers in glass • C. W. Whall
... rose about midnight, and let myself gently down through the window, and shaped my course in the direction of the negro houses, guided by a loud drumming, which, as I came nearer, every now and then sunk into a low murmuring roll, when a strong bass voice would burst forth into a wild recitative; to which succeeded a loud piercing chorus of female voices, during which the drums were beaten with great vehemence; this was succeeded by another solo, and so on. There was no moon, and I had to thread my way along one of the winding footpaths by starlight. When I arrived within a stone—cast ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott
... envy thee as well for thy opportunities, as for thy improvements: and such an impression has thy concluding paragraph* made upon me, that I wish I do not get into a reformation-humour as well as thou: and then what a couple of lamentable puppies shall we make, howling in recitative to ...
— Clarissa, Volume 7 • Samuel Richardson
... implacable detestation of integral tergiversation and exoteric intrigue. They fraternized with a phrenological harlequin who was a connoisseur in mezzotint and falconry. The piquant person was heaping contumely and scathing raillery on an amateur in jugular recitative, who held that the Pharaohs of Asia were conversant with his theory that morphine and ...
— 1001 Questions and Answers on Orthography and Reading • B. A. Hathaway
... provincial peculiarities may, perhaps, have an agreeable effect, as the notes of different birds concur in the harmony of the grove, and please more than if they were all exactly alike. I could name some gentlemen of Ireland, to whom a slight proportion of the accent and recitative of that country is an advantage. The same observation will apply to the gentlemen of Scotland. I do not mean that we should speak as broad as a certain prosperous member of Parliament from that country[473]; though ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell
... the oratorio, for it is undoubtedly the highest form of musical dramatic art, and is founded upon and contains the greatest and deepest truths of the Christian life. As regards the actual music forms employed, we find, indeed, similar ones in the operas, such as the various forms of recitative, the aria, the duet, and the chorus, and even the scena; but in the sacred works, who are the heroes and heroines? Are they not the instruments of the Divine power, the messengers of the good tidings? And what are the subjects? Are they not the struggles, the trials, ...
— The Girl's Own Paper, Vol. VIII, No. 357, October 30, 1886 • Various
... The recitative, "Care compagne," etc, addressed to the assembled villagers, fell from her lips with a purity of enunciation that made each syllable seem like a note from a silver bell. And then the air, "Come per me sereno," held the ...
— A Siren • Thomas Adolphus Trollope
... heartily tired. I intended to say some things about certain owls, amongst other grievances I am pestered with in this republic; but shall cut them all short, and wish you good-night; for the opera is already begun, and I would not miss the first glorious recitative ...
— Dreams, Waking Thoughts, and Incidents • William Beckford
... pi-pi, the procession formed anew, enclosing us in its centre; where I remained part of the time, carried by Kory-Kory, and occasionally relieving him from his burden by limping along with spear. When we moved off in this order, the natives struck up a musical recitative, which with various alternations, they continued until we arrived at the place ...
— Typee - A Romance of the South Sea • Herman Melville
... number of men and boys assemble about 9 p.m., in the street and sing chants set to music by some poet of Gujarat or Hindustan. The chants are really prayers to God for rain, for forgiveness of sins and for absolution from ingratitude for former bounties. One with a strong voice sings the recitative, and then the chorus breaks in with the words "Order, O Lord, the rain-cloud of thy mercy!" Thus chanting the company wanders from street to street till midnight and continues the practice nightly ...
— By-Ways of Bombay • S. M. Edwardes, C.V.O.
... sad expressive recitative that heralded the plaint and the love-scene. There is here the full charm of fugue: a rhythmic quality of single theme, the choir of concerted dirge in independent and interdependent paths, and with every ...
— Symphonies and Their Meaning; Third Series, Modern Symphonies • Philip H. Goepp
... again and again, and, as the performers all chanted well together, the effect was delightful; at the same time the practice unduly lengthens the progress of the songs, some of which go on for hours in a dull, monotonous recitative. ...
— Through Finland in Carts • Ethel Brilliana Alec-Tweedie
... to a later period than in the case of the Evangelia, viz. down to the eleventh century. For the most part they are furnished with a kind of musical notation executed in vermilion; evidently intended to guide the reader in that peculiar recitative which is still customary in the ...
— The Causes of the Corruption of the Traditional Text of the Holy Gospels • John Burgon
... penitent rival to rise. Later, she attempted the final mad scene of the opera—that most complicated and brilliant among the mad scenes on the modern musical stage—with its two cantabile movements, its snatches of recitative, and its bravura of despair, which may be appealed to as an example of vocal display, till then unparagoned, when turned to the account of frenzy, not frivolity—perhaps as such commissioned by the superb creative artist.—By that time, tired, unprepared, in ruin as ...
— The Merry-Go-Round • Carl Van Vechten
... contributions of the military era to the art of singing was a musical recitative performed by blind men using the four-stringed Chinese lute, the libretto being based on some episode of military history. The performers were known as biwa-bozu, the name "bozu" (Buddhist priest) being derived from the fact that ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... the minutest details of this singing and recitation have been the subject of endless wrangling; and even the point whether it was "singing" or "recitation" has been argued. In a wider and calmer view these things become of very small interest. Singing and recitation—as the very word recitative should be enough to remind any one—pass into each other by degrees imperceptible to any but a technical ear; and the instruments, if any, which accompanied the performance of the chansons, the ...
— The Flourishing of Romance and the Rise of Allegory - (Periods of European Literature, vol. II) • George Saintsbury
... sleepy murmurs. One—and the most Infantile of all—not of the Family, has a distinctive note, a copyright tone which none imitates, and which becomes at times a sonorous swelling boom, a lofty recitative, for even an island has its temper and ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield
... [Solo Recitative.] Hail to thee, Burgomaster! Hail to thee, benefactor! Life burns our deeds within its envious fire, But mem'ry, like a phoenix from the pyre, Rises on stalwart wing to waft ...
— Lucky Pehr • August Strindberg
... perpetual carousal which seemed to be kept up in the gallery, and by the drum, and the voice of the 'muezzinn,' or chanter, calling the Turks to prayers from the minaret of the mosck attached to the palace. This chanter was a boy, and he sang out his hymn is a sort of loud melancholy recitative. He was a long time repeating the Eraun. The first exclamation was repeated four times, the remaining words twice; and the long and piercing note in which he concluded his confession of faith, by twice crying out the word 'hou!' ['At solemn sound of ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 2 • George Gordon Byron
... Chinese music with its soft and plaintive airs is a very different thing from the music of grand opera. Chinese music could not be represented on Western instruments, the intervals between the notes being different. Chinese singing is generally "recitative" accompanied by long notes, broken, or sudden chords from the orchestra. It differs widely from Western music, but its effects are wonderful. One of our writers has thus described music he once heard: "Softly, ...
— America Through the Spectacles of an Oriental Diplomat • Wu Tingfang
... this, I say, to the Music of that grand last Scene in Fidelio: Sullivan & Co. supplying the introductory Recitative; beginning dreamily, and increasing, crescendo, up to where the Poet begins to 'feel the truth and Stir of Day'; till Beethoven's pompous March should begin, and the Chorus, with 'Arthur is come, etc.'; the chief Voices raising the words aloft (as they do in Fidelio), and the Chorus thundering ...
— Letters of Edward FitzGerald in Two Volumes - Vol. II • Edward FitzGerald
... apparelled for war! They gallop so proudly along: how sparkle their eyes, how flash their shields. All hearts are thrilled, they chant their battle's story! While my heart is cold, all unmoved by glory." He sang this in recitative, while the music drew nearer and nearer, and as the army passed by, it marched to one of the ...
— Operas Every Child Should Know - Descriptions of the Text and Music of Some of the Most Famous Masterpieces • Mary Schell Hoke Bacon
... kind—a character in Ireland, by the way, that has nearly, if not altogether, disappeared—was provided with a set of prophetic declamations suited to particular occasions and circumstances, and these he recited in a voice of high and monotonous recitative, that caused them to fall with a very impressive effect upon the minds and feeling of his audience. In addition to this, the very nature of his subject rendered a figurative style and suitable language necessary, a circumstance which, aided by a natural flow of words, and a ...
— The Black Prophet: A Tale Of Irish Famine • William Carleton
... of dramatic recitative the work ends. The history of seventeenth-century opera, interesting as it is, does not belong to the subject especially treated in this volume. The authorities consulted will be named from time to time in the pages of ...
— Some Forerunners of Italian Opera • William James Henderson
... monotonous manner possible—using only high throat and head tones, occasionally lowering or raising the voice on a word, to express emotion. This monotonous, and to European ears, strangely nonchalant, nasal recitative, is being continually interrupted by gong pounding and the shrill, high sound of discordant reed instruments. When one or more of the characters commits suicide (which as we know is an honoured custom in China) he sings—or rather ...
— Critical & Historical Essays - Lectures delivered at Columbia University • Edward MacDowell
... evasion of the Puritanical ordinance of 1647, which closed the theatres and forbade dramatic exhibitions of every kind; for "The Siege of Rhodes," although it consisted in a great measure of songs with recitative, explained or illustrated by painted scenery, did not differ much from an ordinary play. Ianthe, the heroine, was personated by Mrs. Coleman, whose share in the performance was confined to the delivery of recitative. Ten years later the lady was entertained at his house by Mr. Pepys, who speaks ...
— A Book of the Play - Studies and Illustrations of Histrionic Story, Life, and Character • Dutton Cook
... foreign theatres, women were first introduced on the scene. In 1656, indeed, Mrs. Coleman, wife to Mr. Edward Coleman, represented Ianthe in the first part of the Siege of Rhodes: but the little she had to say was spoken in recitative."] and her husband, and she sung very finely, though her voice is decayed as to strength but mighty sweet though soft, and a pleasant jolly woman, and in mighty good humour. She sung part of the Opera, though she would not own she ...
— The Diary of Samuel Pepys • Samuel Pepys
... him sounding the depths and cadences of the Living Temple, "bearing on its front this doleful inscription, 'Here God once dwelt,'" was like listening to the recitative of Handel. But Isaiah was his masterpiece; and I remember quite well his startling us all when reading at family worship, "His name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, the mighty God," by a peremptory, explosive sharpness, as of thunder overhead, at the words "the mighty ...
— Spare Hours • John Brown
... oriole piping his cheery recitative in the top of an elm; chickadees uttering their minor strains, and mourning doves soothing our ears with their meditative cooing, we left the sacred spot, to visit Plymouth Rock. We loved to listen to the purling ...
— See America First • Orville O. Hiestand
... done here by slaves in chains, who perform a kind of plaintive melancholy dirge in recitative, to sooth their unavailing toil, which, with the accompanyment of the clanking of their irons, is the real voice of wo, and attunes the soul to sympathy and compassion, more than the most elaborate piece ...
— Voyage of H.M.S. Pandora - Despatched to Arrest the Mutineers of the 'Bounty' in the - South Seas, 1790-1791 • Edward Edwards
... Fairbridge ladies were renowned for punctuality, especially at a meeting like this, and in any case, had one been late, she would never have rung the bell. She would have tapped gently on the door, the white-capped maid would have admitted her, and she, knowing she was late and hearing the hollow recitative of Miss Bessy Dicky's voice, would have tiptoed upstairs, then slipped delicately down again and into a place near ...
— The Butterfly House • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... this in one breathless, monotonous recitative, took the thousand francs out of his breast-pocket and held them out timidly towards the foreign gentleman, who motioned them aside and ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... king Pharaoh, inoculated with a plague greater than any in Egypt, an Italian singer. After desiring me in a surly tone, to call tomorrow morning, your worship mounted your vehicle, and scampered away to the region of recitative. O, cried I, in bitterness of spirit, why has John Bull, my revered patron, quitted his city residence? in his warehouse he has bales of cotton in abundance, and might, like the wise Ulysses, stuff his large and long ears with ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Vol I, No. 2, February 1810 • Samuel James Arnold
... in a style more or less dramatic. Its various parts are assigned to the four solo voices and to single or double chorus, with accompaniment of full orchestra, sometimes amplified by the organ. Like the opera, it has its recitative, linking together and leading up to the various numbers. The origin of the word is to be found in the "oratory," or place of prayer, where these compositions were first performed. Crescimbeni, one of the earliest musical writers, says: "The oratorio had its origin from ...
— The Standard Oratorios - Their Stories, Their Music, And Their Composers • George P. Upton
... for him while he gesticulated is almost universally accepted as an exceptional instance, prompted by the failing of Livius' voice through age[103]. We are now fairly well informed of the tripartite diversion of the dialogue into canticum or song proper, recitative, and diverbium or spoken utterance[104], with the incidental accompaniment of the tibia. Though there may be some dispute as to the apportionment of the various classes, the general truth is established.[105] The important feature of this for our purpose is that, if the ancient tragedy ...
— The Dramatic Values in Plautus • Wilton Wallace Blancke
... A tenor voice was singing a recitative now, and that exquisite accompaniment, with a sort of joyful solemnity, still continued. Every now and then, shrill, high, and clear, penetrated a chorus of boys' voices. I, outer barbarian that I was, barely knew the name of Bach ...
— The First Violin - A Novel • Jessie Fothergill
... prosaic lucidity of sentiment and plot, which is preserved to us in the written text, but raised by the accompanying appeal to the sense, made as it must have been made by such artists as the Greeks, by the grouping of forms and colours, the recitative, the dance and the song, to such a greatness and height of aesthetic significance as can hardly have been realised by any other ...
— English Prose - A Series of Related Essays for the Discussion and Practice • Frederick William Roe (edit. and select.)
... us yesterday in the evening, and to invite Mie Mie and me to come sometimes to hear her daughter-in-law play upon the harp. I did not expect melody in their heaviness, but I shall certainly go, as the recitative part will be in French, and that you know is always ...
— George Selwyn: His Letters and His Life • E. S. Roscoe and Helen Clergue
... romantic practitioner—audience waken up; ballad, 'When Hearts are torn by manly Vows,' by an English tenor—great delight, and encouragement of native talent; glee, 'Glorious Apollo,' or, 'The Red-cross Knight'—very well received; recitative and aria, from Lucia di Lammermoor—very lachrymose; violin solo, by Signor Rosinini, who throws the audience into a paroxysm of delight by imitating a saw and a grindstone; 'The Bay of Biscay,' by the 'veteran' Braham, being positively his ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 436 - Volume 17, New Series, May 8, 1852 • Various
... A quaint recitative of his own, which he generally contrived to vary each night, was the song, a loving croon of sleep and rest. The brotherhood of rest, one might name his theme for grown-up folk; as in the morning, we afterwards learnt, he is wont to sing them another little song of the brotherhood ...
— The Book-Bills of Narcissus - An Account Rendered by Richard Le Gallienne • Le Gallienne, Richard
... say, have mercy on us, is a psalm, composed of verses, which are sung alternately in a very different manner. A celestial music is heard by turns, and the verse following, in recitative, is murmured in a dull and almost hoarse tone. One would say, that it is the reply of harsh and stern characters to sensitive hearts; that it is the reality of life which withers and repels the desires of generous souls. When the ...
— Corinne, Volume 1 (of 2) - Or Italy • Mme de Stael
... "lining the hymn" has disappeared. But on that Sunday morning the Marquis d'Entremont thought he had never heard anything more delightful than these simple melodies sung thus lustily by earnest voices. The reading of each couplet by the minister before it was sung seemed to him a sort of recitative. He knew enough of English to find that the singing was hopeful and triumphant. Wearied with philosophy and blase with the pomp of the world, he wished that he had been a villager in New Geneva, and that he might have had the ...
— Duffels • Edward Eggleston |
