Meanings and Role

THE bass viol was still played by professionals in France and Germany in the early eighteenth century, though in those areas it came to be associated particularly with the aristocracy and even royalty. Players included the Regent of France, Philippe II, Duc d’Orléans, and his son Louis; Louis XV’s daughter Henriette- Anne de France; Louis, Duc de Bourgogne; Friedrich Wilhelm II of Prussia; the Elector Maximilian II Emanuel of Bavaria, his children Franz Joseph, Clemens August and Johann Theodor, and his grandson Maximilian III Joseph; Karl Theodor, Elector of Bavaria; Joseph I of Hessen-Darmstadt; Clemens Wenzeslaus of Saxony; and Joseph von Ursenbeck-Massimi. This is no surprise: the viol had been associated with the aristocracy for more than 200 years, and its low, plaintive and distinctive voice expressed their virtues of reticence, discernment and exclusivity. It was also not a regular member of the orchestra, so its players could sidestep demeaning associations with the world of professional music making. At the same time it was a versatile and flexible instrument, useful for playing all sorts of solo and ensemble music.

Things were rather di“erent in Britain. Many at the time commented on the distinctive nature of British society, relatively egalitarian and unpolarised by comparison with other European countries. As William Guthrie put it 1770: Tn other countries, the great body of the people have little power, and consequently meet with little respect; in Great Britain the people have their due influence, and meet accordingly with a proper share of attention’. He attributed this situation to ‘that happy constitution of government, which, towards the close of the last century, was confirmed to us, and which makes the peculiar glory of this nation’ - that is, the political settlement following the Glorious Revolution of 1688. He pointed out that high culture was not just available to the few: ‘the great body of the people, no less than the dignified, the learned or the wealthy few, had a title to be amused, informed and edified’.

In music this seems to have had two rather di“erent e“ects. The upper classes - ‘the wealthy few’ - seem increasingly to have regarded music as something best left to women or (preferably foreign) professionals.