DICTIONARY OF MUSIC - El Atril

HURDY GURDY HURLSTONE 447
One or other of the bourdons, shown as round
black notes in tlie exampk's, is silenced by a
spring, according as the key is C or G.
In the cut showing the wheel and tangents
one string only is used as a melody string. The
ebony keys are the natural notes, the ivory the
sharps, prom the position in which the Hurdy
Gurdy is held the keys
return by their own weiglit.
The longer strings, deflected
and carried round
the ribs or over the belly
and raised upon projecting
studs, are tuned as drones
or bourdon strings. All
these strings are set in
%"ibration by the wooden
wheel, which, being ro-
sined, has the function of
a violin bow, and is inserted
crosswise in an
opening of the belly just
above the tailpiece, the
motor being a handle at
the tail-end turned by the
player's right hand. There
are two sound-holes in the
belly near the wheel. The
Hurdy Gurdy here represented
is a modern French
instrument (' Vielle en
forme de luth '), 27 inches
in length without the
handle. Two of the drones are spun strings,
and one, the so-called 'trumpet,' is of copper,
and is brought upon the wheel at pleasure by
turning an ivory peg in the tailpiece. There
are also four synijiathetie wire strings tuned in
the fifth and octave. Like lutes and other
medisval instruments, the Hurdy Gurdy was
often much and well adorned, as may be seen
in the Victoria and Albert JIuseum ; fancy
woods, carving, inlaying and painting being
lai-ishly employed. The Hurdy Gurdy has been
sometimes called Rota (from its wheel), but the
Kote of Chaucer had no wheel, and was a kind
of half fiddle, half lyre, with an opening (as in
the Ce^vth) for the hand of the player to touch
the strings from the back. The old Latin
name for a Hurdy Gurdy was Orgaxistiu'm,
and this large form of the instrument it took
two persons to play, as it was so long as to lie
across the knees of both. The artist touched
the keys ; the handle-tm-ner was no more
important than an organ bellows-blower. The
summit of the arch of the Gate of Glory of
Santiago da Compostella,— a cast of which is in
the Victoria and Albert Museum—is occupieil by
two figures playing an Organistrum. The date
of this great Spanish work is IISS. There are
other early representations, especially one in the
museum at Kouen, but the earliest, dating in
the 9th century, was copied by Gerbert from a
JIS. in the monastery of St. Blaise in the Black
Forest, and published by him (Ve Cantu et
Jfiisicd Sacrii) in 1774. Engel has reproduced
this drawing in the work already referred to
(p. 103). The instrument had eight keys acting
on three strings, tuned either in unison or con-
' '
cord. The Sympihonia or ' Chifouie ' was the
Hurdy Gurdy in the 13th century. As for the
name Hurdy Gurdy it was probably made merely
for euphony, like 'hocus pioous, ' 'harum scarnm,'
but it may have been suggested by the peculiar
tone. The Hurdy Gurdy was the prototype of
the Piano Viulix. and all similar sosUnnite
instruments, and we may perhaps see in its
simple action the origin of the Clavichoi:p.
Donizetti's ' Linda di Chamouni ' (1842) contains
two Savoyard songs with accompaniment
for the Hurdy Gurdy. In recent performances
violins and violas, and even the concertina,
have been substituted for the original instrument,
which, however, remains in the score. A. J. H.
By some strange misconception, a common
example of the erroneous nomenclature which
exists among average non-musical persons regarding
the lesser -known instruments, it has
long been the practice, both in literature and
in speech, to refer to the barrel and piano
organs as 'hurdy gurdics. ' This has probably
arisen from the fact that the Italian streer-boy,
who in the twenties and thirties perambulated
town streets with this instrument, in due course
discarded it for a primitive form of organ
which simulated the then popular cabinet
piano. Out of this the modern piano organ
has evolved.
HUKLSTONE, AVilliam Yeates,
f. k.
pianist
and compioser, was born in London, Jan. 7,
1S76. Though coming of a family with artistic
leanings (his grandfather was President of the
Royal Society of British Artists), he did not
enjov- the advantage of upbringing in a musical
atmosphere. His mother was his first instructor
for pianoforte : in comptosition he received no
instruction whatever in early life. Yet at the
age of nine he published a set of ' Five Valses '
for jtianoforte solo, and at the age of eighteen
gained a scholarship at the Royal College of
JIusic. In this institution he studied until
1893, under Stanford for composition, Algernon
Ashton and Edward Dannreuther for pianoforte,
anil left the college a brilliant pianist, with
exceptional gifts as a sight-reader, and pierformer
of chamber music. Ill-health has prevented him
making as many public appearances as a soloist
as he would otherwise have done, but as a composer
he has won considerable reputation. In
Jlay 1904 a series of ' Fantasic-A'ariations on a
Swedish air ' for orchestra from his j:ien was
produced at the fii-st concert of the ' ' Fund (founded
Patron'3
by S. Ernest Palmer), and received
not only the applause of the public, but
also the congratulations of the professors present.
He has further written for' orchestia a pianoforte