"Violin" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... wear no uniform beyond a simple blue riding coat, such as you see. St. Cyr is an excellent officer, but he is not popular, for he seldom speaks to anyone, and he sometimes shuts himself up for days on end in his tent, where he plays upon his violin. I think myself that a soldier is none the worse because he enjoys a glass of good wine, or has a smart jacket and a few Brandenburgs across his chest. For my part I do both, and yet those who know me would tell you that it has not harmed my ...
— Uncle Bernac - A Memory of the Empire • Arthur Conan Doyle
... mind, and another the robin; but their songs are intermixed with several curious abrupt notes unlike any thing English. One utters deliberately "peek, pak, pok"; another has a single note like a stroke on a violin-string. The mokwa reza gives forth a screaming set of notes like our blackbird when disturbed, then concludes with what the natives say is "pula, pula" (rain, rain), but more like "weep, weep, weep". Then we have the loud cry of francolins, ...
— Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - Journeys and Researches in South Africa • David Livingstone
... wide staircase. There was the soft sound of whispered words from bed to bed like the sleepy twitterings of birdlings in their nests, and then silence. Cherry and Lorene were fast asleep. Downstairs the carols ceased, the wail of violin and guitar died away, and the murmur of voices was again borne to the straining ears of the conspirators in the ...
— The Lilac Lady • Ruth Alberta Brown
... and soon we heard the clarionet of Pfifer-Karl and the violin of big Andres resounding through the streets. They were playing the "March of the Swedes," an air to which thousands of poor wretches had left old Alsace for ever. The conscripts danced, linked arms, shouted until their voices seemed to ...
— The Conscript - A Story of the French war of 1813 • Emile Erckmann
... a harp we love to hear; Latin is a trumpet clear; Spanish like an organ swells; Italian rings its bridal bells; France, with many a frolic mien, Tunes her sprightly violin; Loud the German rolls his drum When Russia's clashing cymbals come; But British sons may well rejoice, For ...
— The Lost Ten Tribes, and 1882 • Joseph Wild
... books. But I shrink, in a way, from toying with those feelings. It seems brutal, cruel, merciless. For he is, after all, a delicate instrument, to be treated with delicacy. The soul of him must be kept packed away, like a violin, in its case of reserve well-padded with discretion. Two things I see in him: tenseness and beauty. And these are things which are lost, with rough handling. He shrinks away from brutality. Always, when he came ...
— The Prairie Child • Arthur Stringer
... know. I was trying to sell my violin when you spoke to me, and I would have sold it before, if I hadn't hated to part with it. My violin is all I have and when I'm sad, I find a spot where I can be alone and play to myself. Then I see all sorts of beautiful things in the sky, more ...
— Nobody's Boy - Sans Famille • Hector Malot
... clamoring its last cries horribly. The old shed rattled in every part with the thud of many heavy feet, and trembled with the shock of noise—an incessant roar of men's voices, punctuated with women's screams. Then the riot quieted somewhat; there was a clapping of hands, and a violin began to squeak measures intended to be Oriental. The next moment the listener scrambled up one of the rotting piles and stood upon the veranda. A shaft of red light through a broken shutter struck across the figure above ...
— The Conquest of Canaan • Booth Tarkington
... rich, and yet he came here. He was very pale, and had large and beautiful but sorrowful eyes. He took a violin with him to Mount Carmel; it was the greatest treasure he had on earth, and he played the most wonderful things on this violin that ever were heard, and everybody who heard it said that he was a great musician. In the ...
— The Pearl Story Book - A Collection of Tales, Original and Selected • Mrs. Colman
... nails And anvils three we threw, Likewise four bales of gunny-sacks, Two hundred pounds of glue, Two sacks of corn, four ditto wheat, A box of books, a cow, A violin, Lord Byron's works, ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... the office of parson and conducted the church services to a barn full of colored brethren; by performing the part of mourner whenever the professor undertook to superintend a funeral; and by playing the tambourine in accompaniment to the professor's violin whenever the latter became master of ceremonies for ...
— Ishmael - In the Depths • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... king, enfeebled by age and gout, no longer allowed him to devote himself to the pleasures of the chase, he began playing on the violin more than ever before, in order, he said, to perfect himself in it. This was beginning rather late. As is well known, he had for his first violin teacher the celebrated Alexander Boucher, with ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... desirable that the master should add instrumental to vocal music. He should be able to play on the violin, flute, or clarionet, but, as he must speak much, the former is to be preferred. Such is the influence of the weather, that children are almost always dull on dull days, and then a little music is of great advantage. On wet days, when they cannot go into the play-ground, it assists them in keeping ...
— The Infant System - For Developing the Intellectual and Moral Powers of all Children, - from One to Seven years of Age • Samuel Wilderspin
... not undertake to run an engine or manage a piece of machinery without some careful examination of its parts and capabilities, and some inquiry whether he have the necessary knowledge, skill, and strength to make it do itself and him justice. A man does not try to play on the violin without seeing if his fingers are long and flexible enough to bring out the harmonies and raise his performance above the grade of dismal scraping to that of divine music. What should we think of a man who should set a whole orchestra of instruments upon playing ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 88, February, 1865 • Various
... some time a prisoner in England,—as steward. They were both good-natured, merry fellows. The cook's name was Pierre le Grande, the other we called Jacques Little. He was a small, dapper little Frenchman, and played the violin. He would have fiddled all day long, for he preferred it to anything else; but he could not get any one to dance to him except Le Grande, who, as soon as he had washed up his pots and kettles, came ...
— Will Weatherhelm - The Yarn of an Old Sailor • W.H.G. Kingston
... refreshments at clubs in the intervals, is not such good training as the care of the sick in all weathers for sprinting over a course laid at ninety degrees. Nor again can the best of athletes go swiftly up a ladder if he carries a priceless violin in one hand and its equally priceless bow in his teeth, and handicaps himself with varnished leather buttoned boots. They climbed, ...
— The Idler Magazine, Volume III, June 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... a struck violin, took her winnings, but, supposing all the money on her side of the table to be hers also, earned by the nine louis, began gayly to gather in with small, white-gloved hands ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... had drawn the final squeak from his violin, we got into our vehicle, and in somewhat more than an hour were entering the little village of Nazareth, pleasantly situated among fields the autumnal verdure of which indicated their fertility. Nazareth ...
— Letters of a Traveller - Notes of Things Seen in Europe and America • William Cullen Bryant
... dance, were soft and languorous as a July noon. Limply hung the draperies, slowly waved the graceful arms, and at the end, Patty sank slowly, gently, down on a mound beneath the trees, and, her head pillowed on her arm, closed her eyes, while the violin ...
— Patty Blossom • Carolyn Wells
... me you were coming." Perhaps my eyes did say it. At any rate, she looked as straight at me as I at her, and I noticed that she paled a little and shrank—yet continued to look, as if I were compelling her. But her voice, beautifully clear, and lingering in the ears like the resonance of the violin after the bow has swept its strings and lifted, was perfectly self-possessed, as she said to her brother: "That will be delightful—if you ...
— The Deluge • David Graham Phillips
... accompanied by Densmore who looked in just for one drink before going to a much-touted boxing-match in Jersey. Through the evening she deliberately avoided seeing Banneker alone for so much as the space of a query put and answered, dividing her attention between an enraptured master of the violin who had come after his concert, and an aged and bewildered inventor who, in a long career of secluded toil, had never beheld anything like this brilliant creature with her intelligent and quickening interest in what ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... of making life more complex and subtle. We have the piano, the violin, the orchestra. Yet we also have rag-time, which is a reaction from the nervous tension of American commercial life, a swinging back to the old days when man, though a brute, was free. There is release and exhilaration in the barbaric, syncopated songs and in the animal-like ...
— White Shadows in the South Seas • Frederick O'Brien
... of black hair, and a black moustache—itself a striking novelty—he wielded his baton, encouraged his forces, repressed the turbulence of his audience with indescribable gravity and magnificence, went through all the pantomime of the British Army or Navy Quadrilles, seized a violin or a piccolo at the moment of climax, and, at last, sunk exhausted into his gorgeous velvet chair. All pieces of Beethoven's were conducted with a jewelled baton, and in a pair of clean kid gloves, handed him, at the moment, on a ...
— Gossip in the First Decade of Victoria's Reign • John Ashton
... much practical moment deserves a little more consideration. It should not be taught by chance, or in fragments, but duly deployed, expounded, and enforced. It is of far more pressing importance, for example, than the art of playing the piano or the violin, and is quite as ...
— From a Girl's Point of View • Lilian Bell
... lighter than silk slippers make Upon a ballroom floor, when sweet Violin and 'cello wake Music for ...
— Songs of Childhood • Walter de la Mare
... in the deeps of the heavens in silence. An odious smell rose from the bay as the tide went out, a seal bawled in the distance, fishes flopped about in the pools beneath me, and a man playing a violin somewhere in the village added a melancholy note. I could hear the boys crying, "All about the war," and Ladrone continued restless and eager. Several times in the night, when he woke me with his trampling, I called to him, and hearing ...
— The Trail of the Goldseekers - A Record of Travel in Prose and Verse • Hamlin Garland
... its heterogeneous, contents. You would think a small music warehouse, a miniature tobacco shop, or branch depot of foreign grammars and dictionaries were before you. Every kind of musical instrument seems to have met with a companion in this tiny apartment. Here are a violin, violoncello, horn, and cornopean; there an old Welsh harp and unstrung guitar. On this shelf are pipes of all sorts and sizes, forms, and nations—the straight English, the short German, and the long Turkish; on that are cigar-boxes, snuff-boxes, and tobacco-boxes ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale
... intellectual interests besides reading and writing. He was always interested in music, himself playing the guitar and harp and violin; and one of his proudest achievements was the perfection of a musical instrument called the armonica, which consisted of a series of glasses so designed as to give forth the notes of the musical scale when chafed with the ...
— Benjamin Franklin • Paul Elmer More
... usual on the morning of the 21st; I used to hear the bell ring for the servant, more than once; he occupied the whole of the upper part of the house, I and my husband had the two parlours. I heard him also occasionally playing the violin and trumpet, and he used to walk about; he then wore whiskers. I generally heard his bell; I did not see him come home on the Monday; I saw him in the evening, about half past five; I had heard him in the ...
— The Trial of Charles Random de Berenger, Sir Thomas Cochrane, • William Brodie Gurney
... whose face was ravaged, as if by some passion or sorrow for ever burning within her, had a perfunctory manner which fought with her expression. Her face was too much alive. Her manner was half dead. Only when she played the violin was the whole woman in accord, harmonious. Then truth, vigor, intention emerged from her, and she conquered. To-night she spoke of the prospects for the opera season, looking about her as if seeking fresh causes ...
— The Way of Ambition • Robert Hichens
... procedure is recommended for the piano or violin recital, with the possible addition of certain phrases such as "Yes—of course, she has technique—but, my dear, so has an electric piano." This remark gives you a splendid opportunity for sarcasm at the expense of Mr. Duo-Art and other manufacturers of mere mechanical perfection; ...
— Perfect Behavior - A Guide for Ladies and Gentlemen in all Social Crises • Donald Ogden Stewart
... Violin music testified that the witches were merry. We halted, and the horses neighed and were answered ...
— Lazarre • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... famous sorority, the Phi Sigma Tau, was organized by the four chums for the purpose of looking after high school girls who stood in need of assistance. In that volume Eleanor Savelli, the self-willed daughter of an Italian violin virtuoso, made her appearance. The difficulties Grace and her chums encountered in trying to befriend Eleanor and her final contemptuous repudiation of their friendship made absorbing reading for those interested in following the fortunes of the ...
— Grace Harlowe's First Year at Overton College • Jessie Graham Flower
... my eyes have not closed themselves to sleep: Alexis and Brilliard give me hopes of a kind return to this, and have brought their flute and violin to charm me into a slumber: if Sylvia love, as I am sure she does, she will wake me with a dear consent to see me; if not, I only wake to sleep ...
— Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister • Aphra Behn
... leisure—was done with his "division" of twenty other boys and under the eyes of at least two masters. The only solitude possible was by asking for half an hour's practice in the cell-like music rooms, and Harris smiled to himself as he recalled the zeal of his violin studies. ...
— Three More John Silence Stories • Algernon Blackwood
... ship many years ago, and wrote a book upon it, in which he playfully remarks that he got the full value of his passage money, inasmuch as there was a birth, a death, and a suicide, between Plymouth and Melbourne. Another of his distinctions is great dexterity in playing the violin, his favourite pieces being "The Scalloway Lasses" and "The Auld Wife ayont the Fire." The title of the last-named piece rather staggered me, until I was informed by one of the ministers, who is a scholar and an antiquarian, that it relates to a time when ...
— Literary Tours in The Highlands and Islands of Scotland • Daniel Turner Holmes
... dinner was over, the room was cleared of the tables, and swept; the music, consisting of a guitar, flute, and violin, called in; and the ball was opened. At first the forest belles were rather shy in the presence of strangers; but they soon warmed up, and began to dance with more animation. They were all dressed in calico or muslin ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 101, March, 1866 • Various
... less trouble to fold a paper when it has been folded already. This saving of trouble is due to the essential nature of habit, which brings it about that, to reproduce the effect, a less amount of the outward cause is required. The sounds of a violin improve by use in the hands of an able artist, because the fibers of the wood at last contract habits of vibration conformed to harmonic relations. This is what gives such inestimable value to instruments that have belonged to great masters. Water, in flowing, hollows out for itself ...
— The Mind and Its Education • George Herbert Betts
... at Pettingil's saloon. Pettingil was the Delmonico of Rivermouth. He furnished ices and confectionery for aristocratic balls and parties, and didn't disdain to officiate as leader of the orchestra at the same; for Pettingil played on the violin, as Pepper Whitcomb described ...
— The Story of a Bad Boy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... parallel between colour and music can only be relative. Just as a violin can give various shades of tone,—so yellow has shades, which can be expressed by various instruments. But in making such parallels, I am assuming in each case a pure tone of colour or sound, unvaried by vibration ...
— Concerning the Spiritual in Art • Wassily Kandinsky
... without the slightest ill-feeling, and I remained with father. He was very fond of me, and would permit no one else to teach me. At seven I was drawing and painting under his guidance. At eight the violin was put into my hands and my studies in voice began. In the meantime father was most careful not to neglect my physical training; he taught me the use of Indian clubs, and how to walk easily. At eight I ...
— The Darrow Enigma • Melvin L. Severy
... permitted to wish that Wagner had here resisted the tide of progress. It is not only that the tone and power of binding are injured, but the whole character of horns and trumpets is altered when they are expected to sing chromatic passages like the violin and the clarinet. As the point is of some interest, I should like to bring it before the reader with some examples. The essential character of the horns is nowhere more truly conveyed than in the soft passage near the beginning of the overture to Der Freischuetz, and it is the contrast ...
— Wagner's Tristan und Isolde • George Ainslie Hight
... this conversation, Eve having taken the precaution to have the piano tuned before quitting port, an expedient we would recommend to all who have a regard for the instrument that extends beyond its outside, or even for their own ears. John Effingham executed brilliantly on the violin; and, as it appeared on inquiry, the two younger gentlemen performed respectably on the flute, flageolet, and one or two other wind instruments. We shall leave them doing great justice to Beethoven, Rossini, and Mayerbeer, whose compositions Mr. Dodge did not fail to sneer ...
— Homeward Bound - or, The Chase • James Fenimore Cooper
... the window again, and took from the table a violin wrapped in buckskin, and softly he played one of their old love songs. It was not much more than a whisper, and yet it was filled with a joyous exultation. He laid the violin down when he was finished, and laughed, and filled his pipe, and ...
— Back to God's Country and Other Stories • James Oliver Curwood
... on the harp opened the Eistedfodd, as the Welsh literary congress is called, but this time they had engaged for the fairies a funny little fellow to start the programme with a solo on his violin. ...
— Welsh Fairy Tales • William Elliot Griffis
... played the violin accompaniment to the burning of Rome, down, through the ages, to 5:15 a. m., April 18, 1906, and up to the present date, the San Francisco disaster is the most prominent recorded in history. It was the greatest spectacular drama ...
— The Spirit of 1906 • George W. Brooks
... usual, was Peter Coleman. Susan knew in a happy instant that he had gone to find her at her aunt's, and had followed her here, and during the meal that followed, she was the maddest of all the mad crowd. After dinner they had Josephine's violin, and coaxed Betsey to recite, but more appreciated than either was Miss Brown's rendition of selections from German and Italian opera, and her impersonation of an inexperienced servant from Erin's green isle. Mrs. Carroll laughed until the tears ran down her ...
— Saturday's Child • Kathleen Norris
... around the room in a circle. The leader assigns to each some imaginary musical instrument—horn, fife, drum, trombone, violin, harp, flute, banjo, etc. Some well known, but lively air is given out and the band begins to play, each player imitating as nearly as possible the instrument he has been assigned. All goes well until the leader suddenly drops his instrument and begins playing ...
— Games For All Occasions • Mary E. Blain
... inspires the poet; who makes the flute, guitar, and violin eloquent under the fingers of the wandering and homeless artist: it is she who bears him upon her light wing from the source of the Moldau to that of the Danube; it is she who crowns his dark locks with the glittering dewdrops, who makes the sparkling stars shine so ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No 3, September 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... Endicott this clear, bold, dashing script, which ran full speed across the page, yet turned with ease and leisurely from the margin. What a pity Edith could not see with her own eyes these silent witnesses to the truth. Beyond the study was a music-room, where hung his violin over some scattered music. Horace Endicott hated the practising of the art, much as he loved the opera. It was all very sweet, just what the detective would have looked for, beautiful to see. He could have lingered in the rooms and speculated on that ...
— The Art of Disappearing • John Talbot Smith
... intentions which were ignorant of any test save exactness in hitting their mark. He told Gertrude how he had walked over France and Italy with a painter's knapsack on his back, paying his way often by knocking off a flattering portrait of his host or hostess. He told her how he had played the violin in a little band of musicians—not of high celebrity—who traveled through foreign lands giving provincial concerts. He told her also how he had been a momentary ornament of a troupe of strolling actors, engaged in the arduous task of interpreting ...
— The Europeans • Henry James
... a series of chances. His father failed to succeed and disappeared back to Africa leaving the support of the child to the poor working mother. The child showed evidences of musical talent and a friendly workingman gave him a little violin. A musician glancing from his window saw a little dark boy playing marbles on the street with a tiny violin in one hand; he gave him lessons. He happened to gain entrance into a charity school with a master of understanding mind who recognized genius ...
— Darkwater - Voices From Within The Veil • W. E. B. Du Bois
... were pleasing, his conversation agreeable to a degree. Indeed, he had profited so well by the lessons of the excellent-hearted Father Marco, that his mind was well stored with intellectual wealth. He was, moreover, a finished musician, and played the violin, at that period a rare accomplishment, to perfection. In addition to all these qualifications, he was a skillful versifier, and composed the most beautiful extemporaneous poetry, apparently without an effort. But his disposition was by no means light or devoted ...
— Wagner, the Wehr-Wolf • George W. M. Reynolds
... wondering, incredulous, for at that moment across the water came the golden singing of a violin. Wonderfully low and tender it began. Swelling, it rose and soared and trembled, then with lingering, chorded sweetness died away like the exquisite music of ...
— Where the Sun Swings North • Barrett Willoughby
... society call? If I didn't enjoy Brown I'd not visit him so frequently; but, liking him, I go again and again. So with Dickens, Mark Twain, and Shakespeare. The story goes that a second Uncle Remus was sitting on a stump in the depths of a forest sawing away on an old discordant violin. A man, who chanced to come upon him, asked what he was doing. With no interruption of his musical activities, he answered: "Boss, I'se serenadin' m' soul." Book or violin, 'tis all the same. Uncle Remus and I are serenading our souls and the ...
— Reveries of a Schoolmaster • Francis B. Pearson
... needed to render those grand harmonies which are woven in the modulation of sonorous chords. A skilful hand may draw a scale from wooden blocks set upon ropes of straw, but the great musician must hold the violin, or must feel the keys of the organ under his fingers and the responsive pedals at his feet, before he can expect to interpret fittingly the immortal thought of the composer. The strings must vibrate in perfect tune, the priceless wood must be seasoned and ...
— The Witch of Prague • F. Marion Crawford
... the guitar, the violin, the flute, the cymbals, the trumpet, and the conch-shell. There is the luptima also, another very curious instrument, formed of a dozen long perforated reeds joined with bands and cemented at the joints with wax. The orifice at one end is applied to the lips, and a very moderate ...
— The English Governess At The Siamese Court • Anna Harriette Leonowens
... enjoy instrumental music, and will listen to piano or violin while quietly occupied, for example if they are drawing. One Nursery School teacher plays soft music to get her babies to sleep, and our little ones fidget less if some one sings softly ...
— The Child Under Eight • E.R. Murray and Henrietta Brown Smith
... achieved the five pairs of stairs, we heard the sound of voices and the scraping of a violin, and on the fifth landing were received by a pretty young lady in a coquettish little cap, whom Mueller familiarly addressed as Annette, and who piloted us into a very small bed-room which was already full of hats and coats, bonnets, shawls, and umbrellas. ...
— In the Days of My Youth • Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
... course," rather hastily. "Charity begins at home, but it ought not to stop there. If I chose to waste my time practicing for Fred's violin, and attending to all his thousand and one fads and fancies, what would become of all my parish work? You should have heard Mr. Arnold's sermon last Sunday, Esther; he spoke of the misery and poverty and ignorance that lay around us outside our homes, ...
— Esther - A Book for Girls • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... can teach the use of the diamond; it is as sensitive to the hand as the string of a violin, and a good workman feels with a most delicate touch exactly where the cutting edge is, and uses his tool accordingly. Every apprentice counts on spoiling a guinea diamond in the learning, which will take him from ...
— Stained Glass Work - A text-book for students and workers in glass • C. W. Whall
... meetings, all that was sung in the choir, everything that passed there; the beautiful and noble habits of the canons, the chasubles of the priests, the mitres of the singers, the persons of the musicians; an old lame carpenter who played the counter-bass, a little fair abbe who performed on the violin, the ragged cassock which M. le Maitre, after taking off his sword, used to put over his secular habit, and the fine surplice with which he covered the rags of the former, when he went to the choir; the pride with which I held my little flute to my lips, and seated myself in the orchestra, ...
— The Confessions of J. J. Rousseau, Complete • Jean Jacques Rousseau
... (Not a toot!), While the leading violin And the flute Wail and plead in low duet Till, it may be, eyes are wet. She her trombone doth forget— She ...
— In Divers Tones • Charles G. D. Roberts
... work, but the boy had one way to amuse himself that served to pass many an hour when he would not otherwise have known what to do. He was very fond of music, and his father one day brought him from the town a small fiddle, or violin, which he soon learned to play upon. I don't suppose he was a very fine musician, but the tunes he played pleased himself; as well as his father and mother, and Bobby's fiddle soon became his ...
— Mother Goose in Prose • L. Frank Baum
... enough it may seem to him excellent at the time of writing. The perception of the fingers, as well as the perception of the mind, seems blunted by the use of alcohol. Dr. Alfred Carpenter relates that a celebrated violin player, as he was about to go on the platform, was asked if he would take a glass of wine before he appeared, "Oh, no, thank you," he replied, "I shall have it when I come off." This answer excited Mr. Carpenter's curiosity, and ...
— Study and Stimulants • A. Arthur Reade
... of ceremonies at the dinners. Always they had two Italians in to play a violin and harp and had a little ...
— The Trimmed Lamp • O. Henry
... like to try your voice," he said, turning pointedly away from her companion. "I am interested in voices. Can you sing to the violin?" ...
— Song of the Lark • Willa Cather
... violin. Back on the bank, dripping wet, he hugged it to him like a little girl with a doll that was ...
— The Desert Fiddler • William H. Hamby
... street. The storm had passed away; the street was white with hail and snow; the moon shone clearly down between the tall but dilapidated houses of which the street or lane was composed; various riotous-looking people were passing by; and from a neighboring house the brisk strains of a violin came, together with the sound of voices and laughter. The house had a bad repute in the neighborhood, but Mrs. Carson never for an instant suspected her son was there. She looked anxiously along the street, and ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various
... others, and is at best but an imperfect exhibition on a perfect instrument; a mere piece of charlatanerie, or theatrical 'gag,' to use a professional term, sufficiently intelligible. There have been, and are, mighty musicians on the violin. Spagnoletti, De Beriot, Ole Bull (who according to some plays without any string at all), Sivori, Joachim, Ernst, Levey, &c. &c., are all in the list of great players; but there never was more than one Paganini; he ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various
... faded out of my life I still remember with grateful and tender feelings, especially a young man considerably older than myself, to whom I was passionately devoted. He was a handsome, reserved fellow with the eyes and lips of genius. He played the violin, and well do I recall the sensitive twitchings of his mouth at any strain of unusual thrilling sweetness. It made my heart beat faster when he spoke to me, which was rarely; and never before had I felt such a deep emotion as ...
— Confessions of Boyhood • John Albee
... "anti-scrofuloso." The Figwort is named in Somersetshire "crowdy-kit" (the word kit meaning a fiddle), "or fiddlewood," because if two of the stalks are rubbed together, they make a noise like the scraping of the bow on violin strings. In Devonshire, also, the ...
— Herbal Simples Approved for Modern Uses of Cure • William Thomas Fernie
... music, and asserts that it is as easy as dancing; that the music "fairly lifts you out of the saddle," and that the pleasure of equestrian exercise is doubled when it is done to the sound of the flute, violin, and bassoon, or whatever may ...
— In the Riding-School; Chats With Esmeralda • Theo. Stephenson Browne
... front curtain, opening in the middle, revealed a bare stage with perhaps a balcony at the back. This was sometimes used by the actors, but where the play did not require a balcony, visitors to the play would find their places there, just as at the Queen's Hall, when a piano or violin recital is given, the orchestra is sometimes added to the auditorium. A trumpet flourish warned playgoers that the curtain was about to rise, and between the acts a small company of musicians ...
— William Shakespeare - His Homes and Haunts • Samuel Levy Bensusan
... had made a mistake in the number. The house was blazing with lights, upstairs and down; there was an unmistakable air of revelry about it; faintly the music of a new dance tune, violin and piccolo and piano, crept out into the night. Above the music he could hear gay voices, muffled by ...
— The Everlasting Whisper • Jackson Gregory
... odours you would always encounter a smell of leather from the saddler's shop, and a mingled message of bacon and cheese from the very general dealer's—in whose window hung what seemed three hams, and only he who looked twice would discover that the middle object was no ham, but a violin—while at every corner lurked a scent of gillyflowers and southernwood. Idly supreme, Portlossie the upper looked down in condescension, that is in half concealed contempt, on ...
— Malcolm • George MacDonald
... unvanquished doubts and suspicions torture him into harsh interrogations, and he asks her if she loved Pelleas "with a forbidden love," an oboe and two flutes recall, p et doux, the Rapture motive. Later, in succession, we hear (on a solo violin over flute and clarinets) the Pelleas theme (page 289, measure 2), the motive of Gentleness, for the last time (page 290, measure 3), and the Melisande theme (pages 290-292). As Melisande recognizes Arkel, and asks if it be true "that the winter ...
— Debussy's Pelleas et Melisande - A Guide to the Opera with Musical Examples from the Score • Lawrence Gilman
... their best; the men riding about among the houses, and the women sitting on carpets before the doors. Under the piazza of a pulpera two men were seated, decked out with knots of ribbons and bouquets, and playing the violin and the Spanish guitar. These are the only instruments, with the exception of the drums and trumpets at Monterey, that I ever heard in California; and I suspect they play upon no others, for at a great fandango at which I was afterwards ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... wind instruments, as the trumpet, and the organ;—stringed instruments, as the harp or lyre, violin, &c.; and instruments of concussion, in which the sound is produced by striking a sonorous body, as for instance ...
— A Catechism of Familiar Things; Their History, and the Events Which Led to Their Discovery • Benziger Brothers
... brave, highly competent in military art, he was as skillful in getting action from his giant gun as he was masterful in evoking music from his violin! If there was anything his platoon boys admired more, even than himself, it was the music of his ever generous, ever delighting violin. Deep in some dugout we would gather around him. Tenderly and fondly he would take the instrument from ...
— The Greater Love • George T. McCarthy
... Oglesby could play a violin splendidly. A man came along with one in his hands, and Oglesby asked if he might borrow it for the evening, to which the man consented. He commenced playing in order to attract the crowd from Robinson, ...
— Fifty Years of Public Service • Shelby M. Cullom
... is a guitar with muga silk strings, which is played with a little wooden key held in the hand. Ka maryngod is an instrument much the same as the last, but is played with a bow like a violin. Ka marynthing is a kind of guitar with one string, played ...
— The Khasis • P. R. T. Gurdon
... his violin, which he had clung to through all their mad drive, and struck up "Money Musk," which he played as correctly and in as good time as was possible under the circumstance. Soon collecting his nerve and coolness as he went on, he scraped out his whole rpertoire of dancing ...
— Woman on the American Frontier • William Worthington Fowler
... and this is what took place once when she was on board with him. They were in port, and there was a large party of friends and officers spending the evening on the ship, when a sudden storm arose, and no one could go on shore. They were going to amuse themselves with music, and a violin was brought, but a string broke before the instrument had been touched. "Never mind," said the captain, "I have a man on board who is a first-rate hand at deceiving the sight." Everyone was pleased ...
— The Adventure of Living • John St. Loe Strachey
... he herded his cattle, or shot and fished; but so gentle was his nature, that lariat and rifle seemed transformed into pipe and crook of shepherd. Light wines from the Medoc, native oranges, and home-made sweet cakes filled his largest conceptions of feasts; and violin and clarionet made high ...
— Destruction and Reconstruction: - Personal Experiences of the Late War • Richard Taylor
... was not mentioned. The voice of the drill-sergeant was not heard, but the dancing-master with his kit attended twice a week, like Rose, all the year round. The harp was played by the pupils instead of the violin. Withal there was much careful learning and repeating of Sunday Collects and the ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler
... instinct with these Hungarian gipsies. They play by ear, and with a marvellous precision, not surpassed by musicians who have been subject to the most careful training. Their principal instruments are the violin, the violoncello, and a sort of zither. The airs they play are most frequently compositions of their own, and are in character quite peculiar, though favourite pieces from Wagner and other composers are also given by them with great effect. I heard on this occasion ...
— Round About the Carpathians • Andrew F. Crosse
... to be a model for the Zangiacomo of Victory. Having got a clear line of sight I naturally (being idle) continued to look at the girl through all the second part of the programme. The shape of her dark head inclined over the violin was fascinating, and, while resting between the pieces of that interminable programme she was, in her white dress and with her brown hands reposing in her lap, the very image of dreamy innocence. The mature, bad-tempered woman at the piano might have been her mother, though ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad
... exclaimed Budge, in great excitement. "There!—the piano's shut! Isn't that too mean! Oh, I'll tell you—here's Uncle Harry's violin." ...
— Romance of California Life • John Habberton
... the music of a little orchestra had been tinkling pleasantly. Now a man with the harp, another with a violin, and a third with a huge guitar, came up the companionway and grouped themselves to play upon the upper deck. The three musicians were all foreigners—French or Italian. The man who played the harp was a huge, fleshy man, with a red waistcoat and long, black mustache. The ...
— Ruth Fielding at Briarwood Hall - or Solving the Campus Mystery • Alice B. Emerson
... this mass, where the animal itself commences to appear, shows, first, a round-shaped figure, which soon assumes form like a pear, and then like a violin. Gradually the busy little cells arrange themselves to build up heart, lungs, brain, stomach, and limbs, for which the yelk and white furnish nutriment. There is a small bag of air fastened to one end inside of the shell; and when the animal is complete, this air ...
— The American Woman's Home • Catherine E. Beecher and Harriet Beecher Stowe
... Not only this—there were pleasant musical and social evenings. There were voices and instruments; Mrs. Mouat, with the piano brought out with her from England; Mr. Augustus Pemberton, lately arrived from Ireland with his flute; Mr. B. W. Pearse, with his violin; I did what I could with my 'cello, the instrument my father had ...
— Some Reminiscences of old Victoria • Edgar Fawcett
... old, old elf who had been playing for the dance. Taking his violin from him, she gave it to Donal. You see, the queen knew the dearest wish ...
— The Child's World - Third Reader • Hetty Browne, Sarah Withers, W.K. Tate
... capacity should not be lost for want of cultivation; and accordingly provided him with a master, by whom he was instructed in the principles of the art, and soon became a proficient in playing upon the violin. ...
— The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom, Complete • Tobias Smollett
... not call him a poet that writes for his own diversion, any more than that gentleman a fiddler who amuses himself with a violin.—Swift. ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XX. No. 557., Saturday, July 14, 1832 • Various
... is this," said the Count. "You know that I am an exquisite player on the violin, though I did not bring one with me; for I might have been mistaken, had I done so, for an itinerant musician. The idea that has occurred to me is that I will purchase one, so that I may be able to accompany the fair Vrouws when they play the piano. They are sure to be ...
— Voyages and Travels of Count Funnibos and Baron Stilkin • William H. G. Kingston
... go to a distant cousin who did not understand the use of it at all. And he thought that, if it were to go very cheap, perhaps Rico could buy it. Presently he bethought himself that if he could not use the violin, neither would he have any use for money. For all that, he could not bring himself to let the instrument, for which he had paid down six hard gulden, go ...
— Rico And Wiseli - Rico And Stineli, And How Wiseli Was Provided For • Johanna Spyri
... did not much effect social accomplishments. He had a passion for music and learned to play the violin. With this instrument he was wont to entertain himself in the intervals of study. Sometimes he would play for company. It was one of his habits to break off suddenly and rather capriciously in the midst of what he was doing. Thus did he ...
— James Otis The Pre-Revolutionist • John Clark Ridpath
... this long anguish! And then again it was less something he saw than something he was writing, and he altered it to make it more dramatic. "I woke up." How awful that was! but in this new scene she uttered no words. Lady Pippinworth was in his arms when they heard a little cry, so faint that a violin string makes as much moan when it snaps. In a dread silence he lit a match, and as it flared the figure of a girl was seen upon the floor. She was dead; and even as he knew that she was dead he recognized her. "Grizel!" he cried. The other woman who had lured him from his true love uttered a piercing ...
— Tommy and Grizel • J.M. Barrie
... high platform before the black tent, a voice came through a megaphone: "The Big Show. The BIG Show. See those enormous lions riding in baby carriages while La Gonizetti makes other lions dance the fandango to her violin. See those—" ...
— Fran • John Breckenridge Ellis
... found at one time on a Saturday night. Many of the beer-shops are a haunt of the young of both sexes among the factory people, 'the majority with faces unwashed and hair uncombed, dancing in their wooden clogs to the music of an organ, violin, ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 449 - Volume 18, New Series, August 7, 1852 • Various
... else—he can buy what he likes as long as he keeps the instruments in order and in tune. Charles II. had a good ear. In 1676 Purcell was appointed "copyist" of Westminster Abbey, whatever post that may have been. In 1677 "Henry Purcell" is "appointed composer in ordinary with fee for the violin to his Majesty, in the place of Matthew Lock, deceased." I fancy that his tuition from Dr. Blow must have been mainly in organ-playing, in which art Dr. Blow was an esteemed master. At the same time, we ...
— Purcell • John F. Runciman
... always great fun. The players stand in rows before the leader or "conductor," who sings a verse from any well-known nonsense or other song. Then he says, pointing to one of the players, "and the first violin played this simple melody," whereupon the two sing the verse over again, the player imitating with his arms the movements of a violin player, and with his voice the sound of a squeaking fiddle. Then the conductor says, pointing to another player, "and the big trombone played ...
— What Shall We Do Now?: Five Hundred Games and Pastimes • Dorothy Canfield Fisher
... days on shore, we had a very diverting scene with them, which exhibited strongly the great difference there is in the nature of the two classes of savages we now had such opportunities of observing. I had brought my violin from Sydney, on which I used to play occasionally. The New Zealanders generally expressed the greatest dislike to it; and my companions used to rally me much on the subject, saying it was not that the savages ...
— A Narrative of a Nine Months' Residence in New Zealand in 1827 • Augustus Earle
... listened—listened with some wonder and some delight—I believe I gaped. The strings of the "upright grand" were in motion, but they were giving vent to neither ballad tune nor comic jig. And chiming in with them were the notes of a violin, played tunefully, accurately, boldly. That last, I knew, must be Cospatric's. I had not seen the instrument here as yet, but I remembered he was supposed to be rather good on it up ...
— The Recipe for Diamonds • Charles John Cutcliffe Wright Hyne
... by the voice gliding from one tone to another, and is equally available on stringed instruments, the violin or 'cello, the mandoline or zither. It is a grace of style much abused by inartistic singers. Being an ornament, good taste dictates that it be used sparingly. A frequent sliding from one tone to another is a grave fault, and most disagreeable to a cultivated ear. To sing legato ...
— Style in Singing • W. E. Haslam
... of various kinds, as well as dancing and singing, until nine o'clock, when they had to turn in, and all lights were extinguished. The officers employed their evenings in reading and writing, with an occasional game of chess, or a tune on the flute or violin, ...
— Notable Voyagers - From Columbus to Nordenskiold • W.H.G. Kingston and Henry Frith
... his lips with a tenderness which her whole appearance seemed to bespeak for her, a sort of practical consideration and carefulness of touch, as if she were an object precious and frail, an instrument for producing rare sounds, to be handled, like a legendary violin, with a ...
— The Tragic Muse • Henry James
... "the stroke," by the by, if we stop to analyze for a moment, is the stroke that comes straight from the heart, tingling up the spinal column, down the arm, and straight to the finger-tips. Ole Bull had it when his violin echoed a full orchestra; Paderewski has it when he rings clearly and sharply some note that vibrates through you for hours after; Booth had it when drawing himself up to his full height as Cardinal Richelieu he began that famous speech, "Around her form I draw the holy circle of our faith"—his ...
— Outdoor Sketching - Four Talks Given before the Art Institute of Chicago; The Scammon Lectures, 1914 • Francis Hopkinson Smith
... little Rhine town in which the old man had settled down more than fifty years before. Both father and son were musicians, and known to all the musicians of the country from Cologne to Mannheim. Melchior played the violin at the Hof-Theater, and Jean Michel had formerly been director of the grand-ducal concerts. The old man had been profoundly humiliated by his son's marriage, for he had built great hopes upon Melchior; he had wished to make him the distinguished ...
— Jean-Christophe, Vol. I • Romain Rolland
... flags. On a table on the platform rested a large basket of flowers, bearing the card of Barrett H. Van Auken, a grandson of Commodore Garrison. Among the pictures on the wall were many relating to Lincoln and the emancipation proclamation. Cheerful music was furnished from a harp and violin. ...
— Henry Ossian Flipper, The Colored Cadet at West Point • Henry Ossian Flipper
... comic opera. The essential difference is that it dispenses with composition, by which the comic opera forms a musical whole, as the songs are set to well-known popular airs. The incessant skipping from the song to the dialogue, often after a few scrapes of the violin and a few words, with the accumulation of airs mostly common, but frequently also in a style altogether different from the poetry, drives an ear accustomed to Italian music to despair. If we can once make up our minds to bear with this, ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art - and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel trans John Black
... was a mixed duet on the flute and trombone between Clarence Smith and Lancelot Diffenberger, with a violin obligate on ...
— You Can Search Me • Hugh McHugh
... Impersonality A Protean Glimpse Power Against Power Life's Priestess Love Now One And One The Violin Gertrude Unity In Space The Shell And The Word The Clock-Tower Bell Ours To Endure Broken Waves Why Sad To-Day? The Ghosts Of Revellers Life's Burying-Ground Beyond Utterance The Suicide For Others ...
— Along the Shore • Rose Hawthorne Lathrop
... about art, and especially about foreign art: but they all pretended more or less to some knowledge of it: and often they really loved it. There were Councils which were very like the coterie of some little Review. One of them would be a playwright: another would scrape on the violin; another would be a besotted Wagnerian. And they all collected Impressionist pictures, read decadent books, and prided themselves on a taste for some ultra-aristocratic art, which was almost always in direct opposition to their ideas. It puzzled Christophe to find these Socialist or ...
— Jean Christophe: In Paris - The Market-Place, Antoinette, The House • Romain Rolland
... allow such musical effeminacy in church. This is, as it was this morning at the Madeleine, when I happened to be present at the interminable funeral of an old banker; they played a military march with violin and violoncello accompaniments, with trumpets and timbrels, a heroic and worldly march to celebrate the departure and the decomposition of a financier!... It is too absurd." And listening no more to the music in St. Sulpice, Durtal transferred himself in thought ...
— En Route • J.-K. (Joris-Karl) Huysmans
... closed. Silence succeeded for a minute; then the Schumann music began again, a violin accompanying. And suddenly, directly opposite the settee, a door swung slowly open, the hand upon the knob invisible. A picture was presented to the stranger's eyes as if somebody had meant to show it to him. He could but look. Anybody, ...
— The Twenty-Fourth of June • Grace S. Richmond
... strike the eye of a stranger on entering the living room was the array of different kinds of musical instruments. At one end of the room stood a small upright piano, a 'cello held one corner, a guitar another; upon a table a cornet was deposited, and on the piano a violin case could be seen, while a banjo hung from a nail ...
— The Sky Pilot in No Man's Land • Ralph Connor
... cheerfully, "not as a sailing master. He may be the best in the world, for all I know. I never seen him sail anything. I never heard him play the violin, neither, for that matter, and he may be a regular jim-dandy on the violin ...
— The Cruise of the Jasper B. • Don Marquis
... room empty, however, though an open violin-case on the table and a music-stand, on which leaflets of Schubert fluttered fitfully in the light breeze that entered through the open window, testified to ...
— A Comedy of Masks - A Novel • Ernest Dowson and Arthur Moore
... all over the room, and then the young people began their performance. Edward Watkins first played on the violin, giving some familiar airs with such spirit that toes went tapping as he drew his ...
— Ethel Morton's Holidays • Mabell S. C. Smith
... voice, violin of flesh and blood made by the Evil One's hand, may I not even execrate thee in peace; but is it necessary that, at the moment when I curse, the longing to hear thee again should parch my soul like hell-thirst? And since ...
— Hauntings • Vernon Lee
... into the world dancing. It is related that Gritry, when he was scarcely four years of age, had an idea of musical tunes. Mademoiselle de Camargo danced at a much earlier age. She was still in arms when the combined airs of a violin and a hautboy caught her ear. She jumped about full of life, and during the whole time that the music was playing, she danced, there is no other word for it, keeping time with great delight. It must be stated that she was of Spanish origin. She was born at Brussels, the ...
— The International Monthly Magazine - Volume V - No II • Various
... long, straight nose, thick lips, an expression rather determined than agreeable. Her mother looks as Semitic as a Jew moneylender in Brick Lane, London. Her husband, Thothmes II., has a weak and poor-spirited countenance—decidedly an accomplished performer on the second violin. The mother wears on her head a snake, no doubt a cobra-di-capello, the symbol of her sovereignty. Thothmes is clad in a loin-cloth. And a god, with a sleepy expression and a very fish-like head, appears in ...
— The Spell of Egypt • Robert Hichens
... legs. It ain't only the Marquess kid you're fightin'. You've got to lick the yeller streak out of yourself before it ruins you." He paused, then magnanimously added, "If you trim him down good and proper, I'll get you a new violin string in place of ...
— Destiny • Charles Neville Buck
... of violin and lute, The lustre of lean tapers in dark eyes, Fair colours, beauteous flowers, faint-bloomed ...
— Collected Poems 1901-1918 in Two Volumes - Volume I. • Walter de la Mare
... they evolved rapidly to become the varied wind instruments typified to-day by the cornet and the tuba. In the same way the reed of the Greek shepherd is the ancestor of the flute and clarionet. Stringed instruments like the guitar, zither, and violin form another class which begins with the bow and its twanging string. The power of the note was intensified by holding a gourd against the bow to serve as a resonance-chamber. When the musician of early times enlarged ...
— The Doctrine of Evolution - Its Basis and Its Scope • Henry Edward Crampton
... staying here, the same as I am. He is very polite, but his tastes are diametrically opposite to mine. He likes wine, walking, women, smoking, painting, violin and piano playing, dogs, ...
— Letters to His Friends • Forbes Robinson
... perfect as absolute health and abundant exercise could make it. She could ride, shoot, throw a fly and steer a yacht better than most women and many men of her class; but for all that she could grill steaks and boil potatoes with as much distinction as she could play the piano and violin, and sing in ...
— The World Peril of 1910 • George Griffith
... acootely that havin' come this far towards homicide I must needs go through if Yuba crowds my hand. But he don't; he's forbearin' an' stands silent an' still. Likewise, I sees his nose, yeretofore the colour of a over-ripe violin, begin to turn sear an' gray. I recovers sperit at this as I saveys I'm saved. Still I keeps the artillery on him. It's the innocence of the gun that holds Yuba spellbound an' affects his nose, an' I feels shore ...
— Wolfville Nights • Alfred Lewis
... dear above all instruments," replied she; "it alone has tones that respond to those of the human heart." [Footnote: The infanta, who played on several instruments, excelled on the violin. Wraxall, vol. ii., ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... quicksilver. The curve of his nose presented an aquiline silhouette, which suggested the Oriental or Jewish type. His hands—thin, slender, full of nerves which projected like strings upon the finger-board of a violin, and armed with claws like those on the terminations of bats' wings—shook with senile trembling; but those convulsively agitated hands became firmer than steel pincers or lobsters' claws when they lifted any precious article—an onyx cup, a Venetian glass, or a dish of Bohemian crystal. This ...
— The Mummy's Foot • Theophile Gautier
... When one can play the violin and can't teach, any more than a cockatoo, what's the good of wasting one's ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... then a blaze of yellow light shining within this circular building, on its red satin and gilt plaster, and on the spacious picture of a blue Italian lake, with peacocks on the wide stone terraces. The noise at first was bewildering. The leader of the orchestra was sawing away at his violin as savagely as if he were calling on his company to rush up and seize a battery of guns. What was the melody that was being banged about by the trombones, and blared aloud by the shrill cornets, and sawed across by the infuriated violins? "When the heart of a man is oppressed ...
— Macleod of Dare • William Black
... Italian opera at Warsaw cannot have been of mean standing, seeing that artists such as the composers Paisiello and Cimarosa, and the great violinist, composer, and conductor Pugnani, with his pupil Viotti (the latter playing second violin in the orchestra), were members of the company. And the King's band of foreign and native players has been called one of the best in Europe. Still, all this was but the hothouse bloom of exotics. To bring about a natural harvest of home produce something else was wanted than royal patronage, ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks
... would play her violin and have a shy for the school Orchestra," she thought. "I'll speak to her if I can ...
— A Patriotic Schoolgirl • Angela Brazil
... Cornell Summer School, spoke on "The Inorganic Basis of the Hebrew Contribution to the World." Professor W.A. Hurwitz of Cornell spoke briefly on the scope of the Menorah movement, and Dr. L. L. Silverman played Kol Nidre on the violin. ...
— The Menorah Journal, Volume 1, 1915 • Various
... sillier than if you were to walk along throwing your money into the gutter. Time ought to be used like money—spent generously but intelligently." He talked rapidly on, with his manner as full of unexpressed and inexpressible intensity as the voice of the violin, with his frank egotism that had no suggestion of vanity or conceit. "Because I systematize my time, I'm never in a hurry, never at a loss for time to give to whatever I wish. I didn't refuse to keep you waiting for your sake but for my own. Now the next hour belongs to ...
— Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise • David Graham Phillips
... fatal to both. But all the toils, and dangers, and exposures connected with the long and perilous voyage of a flat boat, do not appear to the passer-by. As you cut along by the power of steam, the flat boat seems anything but a place of toil or care. One of the hands scrapes a violin, while the others dance. Affectionate greetings, or rude defiances, or trials of wit, or proffers of love to the girls on shore, or saucy messages pass between them and the spectators along the bank, or on the steam-boat. Yet, knowing the dangers ...
— American Scenes, and Christian Slavery - A Recent Tour of Four Thousand Miles in the United States • Ebenezer Davies
... of this date show that two organs existed in the Moravian Church, Broad St., Philadelphia, Pa., and that stringed instruments were used in the services, also that instruments (violin, viola da braccio, viola da gamba, flutes and French horns) were played for the first time in the Moravian Church, ...
— Annals of Music in America - A Chronological Record of Significant Musical Events • Henry Charles Lahee
... Jimmie Dale seemed suddenly to experience some difficulty in finding what he sought, and his fingers went fumbling from one pocket to another. Two men at the table in front of him were talking—their voices, over a momentary lull in violin squeaks, talk, laughter, singing, and the ...
— The Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... guests there was a long-haired and wild-looking foreign personage, who was the "lion" of the evening, and sat with half a dozen admiring women about him. Now he was escorted to the music-room, and revealed the fact that he was a violin virtuoso. He played what was called "salon music"—music written especially for ladies and gentlemen to listen to after dinner; and also a strange contrivance called a concerto, put together to enable the player to exhibit within a brief space the utmost ...
— The Metropolis • Upton Sinclair
... and one could sing, And one could play on the violin— Such joy there was at my wedding, On New Year's day ...
— The Nursery Rhyme Book • Unknown
... consulting-room, a little below your level, where the Doctor sat at his big writing-table that was heaped with notebooks and papers and had a telephone on it, and all sorts of mysterious instruments in shining brass and silver, as brightly polished as the gleaming thing with a lid, shaped like a violin-case and with a spirit-lamp underneath it, in which all sorts of wicked-looking knives and forceps were boiled when they were taken out of the black bag; or into Mrs. Saxham's bedroom, that was on the floor ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... he was safely housed, Rumour, the mother of Legend, got busy about him. Folk began to whisper to each other the news that wonderful music was heard proceeding from out of the stern walls of Dalibor's prison; the sound of a violin was heard by the many who were attracted to the spot by Rumour. No doubt Dalibor learnt to play the violin: the Czech is so intensely musical that he will master any instrument before he has got the hang of the ...
— From a Terrace in Prague • Lieut.-Col. B. Granville Baker
... Tiani invited me to spend the vacation in his town, and I went. Old man, you know Padre Camorra, I suppose? Well, he's a liberal curate, very jolly, frank, very frank, one of those like Padre Paco. As there were pretty girls, we serenaded them all, he with his guitar and songs and I with my violin. I tell you, old man, we had a great time—there wasn't a house we ...
— The Reign of Greed - Complete English Version of 'El Filibusterismo' • Jose Rizal
... taught in all its departments, Instrumental and Vocal, including Pianoforte, Organ, Violin, and all Orchestral and Band Instruments, Voice Culture and Singing, Harmony, Theory and Orchestration, Church Music, Oratorio and Chorus Practice, Art of Conducting; also, Tuning and Repairing Pianos and Organs. All under the very best teachers, in ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume 3, No. 6 • Various
... [Thomas Nicholson, A.M., 1672.] my old fellow-student at Magdalene, come, and we played three or four things upon the violin and basse. ...
— The Diary of Samuel Pepys • Samuel Pepys
... they are not so very much to blame. Even the momentary reflection of love is a good thing; at least, it is better than to know nothing of it. One can fancy that a violin upon which no one had ever played would yet be glad to vibrate faintly in unison with the music of a more favored neighbor; it would bring a sensation of the possibility of music. The stronger harmony is caught up and carried on forever in endless ...
— Paul Patoff • F. Marion Crawford
... are generally admitted to be more melodious than those produced by other kinds of instruments, and many have expressed a desire to see an instrument so constructed as to be played with keys, like the organ or piano forte, and give the tones of the violin. This is the character of the instrument here introduced. It is elegant in appearance; occupies less than half the space of a piano forte, and is so light and portable that a lady-performer may readily place it before her, and thus avoid the necessity,—unpleasant ...
— Scientific American magazine, Vol. 2 Issue 1 • Various
... dress is rather the exception. On gala days the young wear many ribbons and colours, though arranged with little of the taste characteristic of the French people. Both old and young are very sociable in their habits, and love music and dancing. The violin is constantly played in the smallest village, and the young people dance old-fashioned cotillons or danses rondos. The priests, however, do not encourage reckless gaieties or extravagance in dress. Now and then the bishop issues a Pastoral in ...
— Canada • J. G. Bourinot
... was well read in the Greek and Latin authors, as well as in all the moderns of any merit who had written in English, French, or Italian. He had a good ear for music, and was no indifferent performer on the violin, which he used to play like a bass viol, seated on a chair with the instrument between his legs. To the music of the harpsichord and clavichord he was extremely partial, but the smallness of his hands made it impossible for him ever to perform upon these instruments. ...
— Crome Yellow • Aldous Huxley
... or hear a violin in dreams, foretells harmony and peace in the family, and financial ...
— 10,000 Dreams Interpreted • Gustavus Hindman Miller
... after breakfast to read. The Baron retaliates by becoming aware of pretty Miss Rogers' existence. Pretty Miss Rogers' mamma is conspicuously polite to him, and pretty Miss Rogers' self offers to play the piano to his violin. It is Mrs. Steele who brings me these tidings and assures me that Miss Rogers plays well, and, as for the Baron de Bach, he is a master! I resolutely read my book till luncheon time and, going up on deck ...
— Under the Southern Cross • Elizabeth Robins
... trailing branch of the pepper tree, shielded his merry black eyes as he gazed up the road. His slender stock of patience was nearly exhausted before the sound of music reached his ears, and started his feet shuffling. "Padre, oh, Padre," he cried, "they are coming. I can hear the violin: it is Pedro that plays, I would bet anything. Ah, be can play! Yes, and Marta is coming first with the ...
— The Penance of Magdalena & Other Tales of the California Missions • J. Smeaton Chase
... the musicians' instruments, followed this tilted wagon. Some members of the orchestra would not part with theirs, and behind the saddle of many a mounted virtuoso or attendant was fastened a violin case or a shapeless bag which ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... one thing Polly could do it was whistle. Indeed, she insisted that it was her only accomplishment and many a happy little impromptu concert was given in Middies' Haven with Happy's guitar, Shortie's mandolin and Durand's violin. ...
— Peggy Stewart: Navy Girl at Home • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... a violin in the farm-house struck his ear. Someone was fiddling the well-known sprightly air, "Vive ...
— The Young Seigneur - Or, Nation-Making • Wilfrid Chateauclair
... poles. Music, in which string instruments figure most conspicuously, should be selected, as this lends itself best to the weird effect which should be sought. Three or four pieces will generally be sufficient and they may consist of a violin, guitar, banjo and snare drum or the drum may be omitted if not convenient. The committee appointed to gather the refreshments must have the assistance of all the other women of the club, for its work is very arduous ...
— Breakfasts and Teas - Novel Suggestions for Social Occasions • Paul Pierce
... fishing-tackle for members of the university; makes bows and arrows for those who belong to the Archery Society; is an indifferent musician, occasionally amuses under-graduates in their apartments by playing to them country dances and marches on the flute or violin. He published his Life a short time since, in a thin octavo pamphlet, entitled "The Stranger Abroad, or The History of ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... drawings on the roof of the great banquet hall. Remaining within the circuit of Rome, we may turn from the sibyls of S. Maria della Pace to the genii of the planets in S. Maria del Popolo, from the "Violin-player" of the Sciarra palace to the "Transfiguration" in the Vatican: wherever we go, we find the masterpieces of this youth, so various in conception, so equal in performance. And then, to think ...
— Renaissance in Italy Vol. 3 - The Fine Arts • John Addington Symonds
... was followed by Bach's appointment as Kapellmeister to the duke of Coethen, a post which he held from 1717 to 1723. The Coethen period is that of Bach's central instrumental works, such as the first book of the Wohltemperirtes Klavier, the solo violin and violoncello sonatas, the Brandenburg concertos, and ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 1 - "Austria, Lower" to "Bacon" • Various
... service. It was a hot July day, and he walked slowly—for there was plenty of time—with his eyes fixed on the far-off, shimmering sea. That minstrel of heat, the locust, hidden somewhere in the shade of burning herbage, pulled a long, clear, vibrating bow across his violin, and the sound fell lazily on the still air—the only sound on earth except a soft crackle under the Bishop's feet. Suddenly the erect, iron-gray head plunged madly forward, and then, with a frantic effort and a parabola or two, recovered itself, while from the tall grass by the side of the path ...
— The Militants - Stories of Some Parsons, Soldiers, and Other Fighters in the World • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews
... which the largest was a superb view of the rugged harbor of Rio de Janeiro. Comfortable chairs were ranged along the walls, and the middle of the room was occupied by a massive square-cornered table on which lay a jumble of hand-written business papers, a number of books, a high-grade violin and bow. Beyond the table stood a swivel chair, evidently the usual seat of the coronel. Table and chair were so arranged that the master of this house sat always with his back to a wall and his face toward the door. And on a couple of hooks on that wall, ...
— The Pathless Trail • Arthur O. (Arthur Olney) Friel |
