No CrossRef data available.
Article contents
J. W. Windsor and the First English Translation of Marpurg's Abhandlung von der Fuge
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 March 2025
Extract
The name of James William Windsor (1779–1853) is not widely known in scholarly circles today; yet as a pianist, organist and all-round music director, he was instrumental in guiding the musical world of Bath through a turbulent period of economic decline and societal change over the course of a career that spanned nearly six decades. Much of what may be discovered about his activities is gleaned from his large and important music collection, bequeathed to the Royal College of Music (RCM) in 1890 by his eldest daughter, Elizabeth (1805–1890). This collection of printed and manuscript music reveals much about its former owner's interests, activities and friendships, and many of its most significant items lend value to modern editions and musicological research. Of particular relevance to this study is Windsor's own transcription of Bach's Das wohltemperirte Clavier (RCM MS 743, dated 1801), identified by Yo Tomita as being both textually unique and the second earliest known complete English source of this work.
Keywords
- Type
- Essay
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © The Author(s), 2025. Published by Cambridge University Press
References
1 Windsor's earliest performance in Bath dates from 1794; he was still giving piano lessons as late as 1852. The Bath Chronicle (23 January 1794), 3; A Directory for the City and Borough of Bath (Bath: Samuel Vivian, 1852), 194.
2 ‘Minutes of the 6th Meeting of the Executive Committee held at the College on Thursday 16th October 1890’, in his ‘Minute Book: Executive and Finance Committee’, volume 3, 76–77. Royal College of Music Archive.
3 For example, RCM MS 592, as used in Spohr, Louis, Die letzten Dinge, ed. Schallhorn, Irene and Zehl, Dieter (Stuttgart: Carus, 2008)Google Scholar, or RCM MS 522, as used in Robertson-Kirkland, Brianna E., Venanzio Rauzzini and the Birth of a New Style in English Singing: Scandalous Lessons (London: Routledge, 2022), 63–69CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
4 Tomita, Yo, ‘The Dawn of the English Bach Awakening Manifested in Sources of the “48”’, in The English Bach Awakening: Knowledge of J. S. Bach and His Music in England 1750–1830, ed. Kassler, Michael (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2004), 40, 126–127Google Scholar.
5 Kassler, Michael, A. F. C. Kollmann's ‘Quarterly Musical Register’ (1812): An Annotated Edition with an Introduction to His Life and Works (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2008), 10Google Scholar.
6 Kollmann, A. F. C., An Introduction to the Art of Preluding and Extemporizing: In Six Lessons for the Harpsichord or Harp (London: R. Wornum[, 1792])Google Scholar; Kollmann, A. F. C., An Essay on Musical Harmony, According to the Nature of that Science and the Principles of the Greatest Musical Authors (London: J. Dale, 1796)Google Scholar; and Kollmann, A. F. C., An Essay on Practical Musical Composition, According to the Nature of that Science and the Principles of the Greatest Musical Authors (London: author, 1799)Google Scholar.
7 Kollmann, A. F. C., ‘A Retrospect of the State of Music in Great Britain, Since the Year 1789’, The Quarterly Musical Register 1 (1812), 14Google Scholar.
8 Percy Young's introduction to Eliza Wesley, ed., The Bach Letters of Samuel Wesley (New York: Da Capo, 1981), v–xvi.
9 The Bath Chronicle (13 March 1798), 3.
10 Cited in Michael Kassler and Philip Olleson, Samuel Wesley (1766–1837): A Source Book (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2001), 328. Yo Tomita postulates that Windsor contributed corrections to Wesley and Horn's revised version (1819) of their edition of Das wohltemperirte Clavier: see Tomita, ‘Pursuit of Perfection: Revisions of the Wesley/Horn “48”’, in The English Bach Awakening, ed. Kassler, 372–373. This may explain Windsor's acquaintance with Wesley and Wesley's positive assessment of his character.
11 For example, A. F. C. Kollmann, Concerto for the Piano Forte . . . Op. VIII (London: author[, 1804]), RCM D2529/7, inscribed ‘From the author to JW Windsor’.
12 Windsor's subscription copy is RCM D323.
13 Kollmann, Essay on Practical Musical Composition, 25.
14 Friedrich Wilhelm Marpurg, Abhandlung von der Fuge (Berlin: A. Haude und J. C. Spener, 1753–1754).
15 Gerald Antone Krumbholz, ‘Friedrich Wilhelm Marpurg's Abhandlung von der Fuge (1753–4)’ (PhD dissertation, University of Rochester, 1995), 1.
16 Friedrich Wilhelm Marpurg, Traité de la fugue et du contrepoint (Berlin: Haude et Spener, 1756), [iv]. All English translations of Abhandlung von der Fuge cited in this paper are taken from RCM MS 946.
17 Marpurg, Traité, [iv].
18 Marpurg, Traité, [iv].
19 Kassler, Jamie Croy, The Science of Music in Britain, 1714–1830: A Catalogue of Writings, Lectures and Inventions, two volumes (New York: Garland, 1979)Google Scholar, volume 2, 740.
20 Deborah Rohr cites Webbe's ability to speak French in relation to political ideology; Samuel Wesley described Eager as a ‘good Grammarian in French & Italian’. See Rohr, Deborah, The Careers of British Musicians, 1750–1850: A Profession of Artisans (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 167CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Philip John Olleson, ‘The Letters of Samuel Wesley: Social and Professional Correspondence, 1797–1837’ (PhD dissertation, University of Nottingham, 2000), 495.
21 Rohr, The Careers of British Musicians, 64.
22 [William Jones,] A Treatise on the Art of Music (Colchester: author, 1784), vi, cited in Kassler, The Science of Music in Britain, volume 2, 741.
23 Kassler, The Science of Music in Britain, volume 2, 741.
24 Mann, Alfred, The Study of the Fugue (London: Faber, 1958), 142–212Google Scholar.
25 Friedrich Wilhelm Marpurg, Treatise on Fugue, trans. Jane Hines, ed. Derek Remeš (Warsaw: The Fryderyk Chopin Institute, 2022) https://musictreatises.nifc.pl/en/traktaty/27-abhandlung-von-der-fuge-vol-iii (27 March 2024).
26 John Gunn, An Essay Theoretical and Practical, with Copious and Easy Examples on the Application of the Principles of Harmony, Thorough Bass, and Modulation, to the Violoncello (London: Preston, 1802), 17, cited in Kassler, The Science of Music in Britain, volume 2, 741.
27 Only in 1824 did Windsor show an interest in studying French, appearing on the subscription list to a basic introduction to the language. See Prosper Gislot, The Elements of the French Language; Comprising a Number of Simple Rules, and Exercises Adapted to Them (Bath: E. Collings, 1824), viii.
28 Friedrich Wilhelm Marpurg, Traité de la fugue et du contrepoint (Paris: Imbault, 1801). Windsor's copy is RCM D376-D377, inscribed ‘JW Windsor / Bath / Jany. 1803’.
29 Jonathan R. Topham, ‘Science, Print, and Crossing Borders: Importing French Science Books into Britain, 1789–1815’, in Geographies of Nineteenth-Century Science, ed. David N. Livingstone and Charles W. J. Withers (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2011), 314.
30 Typical annotations to theoretical works from Windsor's collection include highlighting of important passages, correction of printing errors, the addition of supplementary information (including biographical notes on authors and composers) and disagreements with an author's argument. An example of the latter is his inscribing ‘More properly a discovery’ in response to Joseph Corfe's assertion that counterpoint is an ‘invention’ (see Windsor's copy of Joseph Corfe, A Treatise on Singing (London[, 1799]), 7 at RCM H240/2). By contrast, besides Windsor's ownership inscriptions inside the two volumes’ covers, no annotations to the Traité exist in Windsor's hand. The volumes in their present state bear some slight damage, which, owing to their convoluted ownership history subsequent to Windsor (see this essay's concluding paragraph), cannot be definitively attributed to any particular party, and should not be taken to indicate heavy use on Windsor's part.
31 The Windsors’ address is given as 10 Lower James Street in The Bath Chronicle (13 March 1806), 3.
32 Inscribed on Marpurg, Traité de la fugue et du contrepoint, RCM D376, 17. My bold italics.
33 Marpurg, ‘A Treatise of Fugue & Counterpoint’, RCM MS 946, 6.
34 Brian Luker, ‘Paper and Papermakers around Wells’, Somerset Archaeology and Natural History 153 (2009), 118.
35 Luker, ‘Paper and Papermakers around Wells’, 121.
36 Hilda F. Gervers, ‘A Manuscript of Dance Music from Seventeenth-Century England: Drexel Collection MS 5612’, in Bulletin of The New York Public Library: Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations 80 (1976–1977), 503–552.
37 Kenneth Edward James, ‘Concert Life in Eighteenth-Century Bath’ (PhD dissertation, Royal Holloway, University of London, 1987), 552.
38 The Bath Herald (5 December 1795), 3. Cook's Bath connections are also evinced by his c1785 publication of service music, which names in its subscription list several Bath clergymen, musicians, organists and music sellers. See Henry Cook, Te Deum Laudamus, Jubilate Deo, Cantate Domino, Deus Misereatur and Five Anthems (London: Longman and Broderip, c1785). RCM D207/11 is the only surviving copy of this work and probably comes from Windsor's collection.
39 [John Bowen, ed.,] A Selection of Favourite Catches, Glees, &c. as Sung at the Harmonic Society, in the City of Bath (Bath: R. Cruttwell, 1797), 27; [John Bowen, ed.,] A Selection of Favourite Catches, Glees, &c. as Sung at the Bath Harmonic Society (Bath: R. Cruttwell, 1799), 17.
40 Gervers, ‘A Manuscript of Dance Music’, 524.
41 RCM MS 805 and MS 1056. [W. Barclay Squire,] ‘Catalogue of Manuscripts in the Library of the Royal College of Music’, four volumes, volume 2, RCM MS 4106, 269, 381.
42 Gervers, ‘A Manuscript of Dance Music’, 524.
43 James, ‘Concert Life’, 553.
44 The Bath Journal (14 March 1803), 3. It may also be assumed that they both performed at the Harmonic Society meeting on 11 March 1803. The Harmonic Society met every Friday until the last week of April, and professional members attended every meeting. See [Bowen, ed.,] A Selection (1799), 7.
45 This was noted in 1827 to include ‘Writing, Reading and Arithmetic, by a schoolmaster, upon an ancient foundation’. [Maria Hackett,] A Brief Account of Cathedral and Collegiate Schools; With an Abstract of their Statutes and Endowments ([London: J. B. Nichols & Son,] 1827), 53.
46 I am grateful to Chris Eldridge for this information.
47 Gervers, ‘A Manuscript of Dance Music’, 526.
48 Anne Crawford, The Vicars of Wells: A History of the College of Vicars Choral (Wells: Close Publications, 2016), 77.
49 Numbers 241–242 in Chained Library Catalogue by Author C https://www.wellscathedral.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Wells-Cathedral-Chained-Library-Catalogue.pdf (11 September 2024).
50 Kassler, The Science of Music in Britain, volume 2, 740–742.
51 Krumbholz, ‘Friedrich Wilhelm Marpurg's Abhandlung von der Fuge’, 213.
52 I am grateful to Dr Mary Frank for providing this translation. Friedrich Wilhelm Marpurg, Abhandlung von der Fuge, ed. Herbert Schneider (Hildesheim: Olms, 2013), xxvi.
53 Derek Remeš, ‘Friedrich Wilhelm Marpurg, “Abhandlung von der Fuge”: Introduction to English Translation’ (Warsaw: The Fryderyk Chopin Institute, 2022) https://doi.org/10.56693/mt.2022.01.03 (4 April 2024).
54 Examples of both are found in RCM MS 946, 3.
55 RCM MS 946, 20.
56 Perhaps as part of ‘a large and very valuable collection of . . . the Standard Treatises on Musical Science, both Theoretical and Practical’, as noted in the 1851 Annual Report. They are not recorded in the Society's 1849 catalogue, but appear as number 42 in the next (1853). In subsequent editions of the catalogue (1862; 1872) they are numbered as 1817 and 2210 respectively. See Seventeenth Annual Report of the Sacred Harmonic Society (London: Mitchell and Son, 1850), 73–92; Eighteenth Annual Report of the Sacred Harmonic Society (London: Mitchell and Son, 1851), 19; [W. H. Husk,] Catalogue of the Library of the Sacred Harmonic Society (London: W. O. Mitchell, 1853), 103; Catalogue of the Library of the Sacred Harmonic Society (London: W. Mitchell, 1862), 232; Catalogue of the Library of the Sacred Harmonic Society (London: The Society, 1872), 284.
57 W. Barclay Squire, Catalogue of Printed Music in the Library of the Royal College of Music, London (London: Royal College of Music, 1909), [i].