Grove's dictionary of music and musicians

SLIDE SLUE 483
way to a truer mode of expression which found
its medium in the change of position on the same
string. Viotti's most gifted pupil, Rode, was
particularly devoted to this method of playing
tender phrases, and no violinist cultivated it
more oarefolly than Rode's imitator and admirer
Spohr. The compositions of the latter are full
of examples of the ' slide ' in its most classical
form, and his Violin School contains some of
the best instructions and examples of the art
to be found.
Huet, Felix, j^tvdes sur les Differentes £coles
de Violmi; Geminani, F., The Art of Playing fhe
Violin ; BaUliot, P., L'Artdu Violon ; Cartier,
J. B. , L'Art du Violon ; Mersenne, Sarmonie
Vniverselle ; Rousseau, Jean, Traite de la Viole,
La Ohronique MitsicaU, August 1873, 'Un
Tirtuose en 1682'; Scudo, P., La Musique
Ancienne et Modeme ; Spohr, Violin School ;
Playford, John, An Inlroduction to fhe SMll of
Musick. o. E.
III. A contrivance fitted in some form or
other to nearly aU wind instruments for the
purpose of adjusting the pitch by altering the
length of the vibrating air-column. It is also
applied in a special form to trombones and to
some trumpets for the purpose of filling up
those notes of the chromatic scale which lie
between the various harmonics or open ' ' notes.
For this particular use of the slide principle
see Trombone and Tkumpet.
For the attainment of the first object the
slide may be simple, as on the flute, or 17-shaped,
as is usual on brstss instruments. As the slide
is used only for the general adjustment of pitch,
it should not move too freely, in case the setting
should be accidentally altered. In instruments
such as the flute and clarinet, the speaking
length of which varies with the opening of the
different side-holes, any permissible alteration
of pitch by means of the tuning-slide, or its
equivalent in the form of socketed joints, is
necessarily small. The reason for this is that
the length added by the extension of the slide
cannot bear a uniform proportion to the vii-tually
different lengths of the instrumentas determined
by the different side-holes ; therefore, no considerable
alteration of pitch can be obtained on
such an instrument without throwing it out
of tune within itself. This apparently trifling
matter is practically important, and the want
of apprehension of it has led many to underestimate
the difficulty and cost of carrying out
such a change of pitch as was determined on by
tlie Philharmonic Society of London in 1896,
when the present (low) pitch was introduced.
The slow progress of the change is largely due
to the limitation of the efficiency of the slide,
and the consequent need of new instruments
constructed to the required pitch.
Attempts have been made to adapt the
shifting slide as used on the trombone, to the
French horn, but the particular proportions of
this instrument and others of the horn type
do not admit of a successful application of the
slide in this way. d. j. b.
SLIVINSKI, Joseph ton, bom at Wai-saw,
Dec. 15, 1865, studied at Warsaw Conservatorium
underStrobl ; atVienna with Leschetizky
for four years ; and finally with Rubinstein at
St. Petersburg. His first appearance in public
was in 1890, and he was not long in finding
his way to England, where he first appeared at
a recital of his own in St. James's Hall, May 17,
1892. In January 1893 he played at one of
Henschel's London Symphony Concerts; at the
Crystal Palace, March 4 ; and at the Philharmonic,
March 9 of the same year. In the following
November he metde his first appearance in New
York. His playing is remarkable for poetical
feeling, as weU as for sm-prising brilliance of
touch. (Baker's Biog. Diet, of Mus. etc.) M.
SLOW MOVEMENT. A generic tei-m for
all pieces in slow time, whether separate or
forming part of a larger work. It is specially
applied to such pieces when they occur in a
work in sonata-form. The right of any movement
to this title must depend rather on its
character than its time indication, for many
movements marked Allegretto are strictly slow
movements. m.
SLUR.
This word, taken in its original and
widest sense, signifies an effect of phrasing
which is more commonly expressed by the
Italian term legato, i.e. connected. The sign of
the slur is a curved line (Ger. Schleifbogen ; Fr.
Liaison) drawn over or under a group of notes,
and the notes included within its limits are said
to be slurred, and are perfoimed witli smoothness,
if on a stringed instrument, by a single
stroke of the bow, or in singing, on a single
syllable. [See Legato, vol. ii. p. 665.] But
although this was originally the meaning of the
word, it is now used in a more restricted sense,
to denote a special phrasing effect, in which the
last of the notes comprised within the curved
line is shortened, and a considerable stress laid
on the first. This effect has already been fully
described in the article Phrasing [vol. iii. p.
713]. In vocal music the slur is employed toindicate
the use of Portamento, and it is also
very generally placed over two or more notes
which are sung to a single syllable. In this
case, however, the sign is superfluous, since if
the passage consists of quavers or shorter notes,
the connection can be shown by writing them
in groups instead of separate, while even if the
notes are crotchets, the fact of there being
but a single syllable sufficiently indicates the
legato. Moreover, an effect analogous to the
slur in instrumental music, whereby the second
of two notes is curtailed and weakened, is
perfectly possible in singing, and may very
probably have been intended by the earlier
composers where the sign of the slur is employed.
This view is insisted upon by Mendelssohn, who