Page:A Dictionary of Music and Musicians vol 4.djvu/360

but he made no use of his gifts as poet, musician, and scholar, and the house reaped little advantage from him. He frequented taverns, drank to excess, and has been known to drink all his companions under the table and finish the night with the landlord. His Irish wife having died childless, he seems to have formed some fresh matrimonial connexion, judging by an appeal made after his death for aid to his wife and destitute children. His downward progress was rapid, and for the last few years of his life he was unknown. He only once returned to his native city—in Dec. 1840, travelling with Lavenu's touring party. It included Liszt, Richardson the flautist, the Misses Steele and Bassano, John Parry, and J. P. Knight; two or three of Wade's concerted pieces were included in the concerts, at which however he did not appear, even as accompanyist. He wandered about for some weeks, visited one or two relatives, and returned to London, where he died, July 15, 1845, at his lodgings in the Strand.

There is little doubt that Wade was a man of remarkable gifts and acquirements. His personal appearance was much in his favour; he was witty and quick in perception, and had acquired some knowledge of the Latin classics, as well as of one or two modern languages, and also had a smattering of anatomy. His memory was retentive in the extreme. Above all, he possessed a gift for creating melody: add to this fair skill as a violinist, and a trifle of orchestral knowledge, and what might not Wade have accomplished but for incredible indolence and folly? It remains but to add a list of his works, with their approximate dates:—'The Prophecy,' an oratorio (Drury Lane 1824);' 'The two Houses of Granada' (ib. 1826); 'The pupil of Da Vinci' (operetta by Mark Lemon); 'Polish Melodies' (words and music) 1831; 'Convent Belles' (with Hawes) 1833; 'A woodland life' (polacca interpolated in 'Der Freischütz' and sung by Braham); 'Meet me by moonlight alone' (sung by Vestris); the duet 'I've wandered in dreams,' and other vocal pieces. This last obtained a popularity equalling the preceding ballad, which had the good fortune to be further immortalised in the pages of Frazer's Magazine for October 1834, by the witty Father Prout, in French attire.

It should be said that Wade was associated with Mr. G. A. Macfarren as pianoforte arranger of the earlier issues of Mr. Wm. Chappell's National English Airs.

[ R. P. S. ]

WAELRANT, Hubert, one of the most distinguished of the second generation of the great Flemish masters, was born about 1518 at Tongerloo,^[1] in the district of Kempenland (North Brabant). An old tradition relates that he went in his youth to Venice, and there studied under the guidance of his great fellow-countryman, Adrian Willaert; but this lacks confirmation, and may very possibly be as apocryphal as the similar story usually told with reference to Sweelinck's sojourn at Venice, and the lessons he had from Zarlino later on in the century. [See Sweelinck.] Be this as it may, Waelrant is found in the year 1544 established in Antwerp, as a singer in the choir of the chapel of the Virgin at Notre Dame. Three years later he had a school of music there, where he introduced a new method of solmisation, that known as bocedisation or the voces Belgicæ.^[2] [See Solmisation; Voces Belgicæ.] He is said now to have entered partnership with J. de Laet as a publisher of music; but this was more probably not until 1554.^[3] The association lasted until 1567, when de Laet retired or died. Waelrant was twice married, first in 1551, and again before 1568; by his first wife he had six children. He died at Antwerp in his seventy-eighth year,^[4] Nov. 19, 1595.

Among contemporaries Waelrant was held in very high repute, not only as a teacher of music, but more especially as a composer, chiefly of madrigals and motets. Guicciardini, in his 'Descrittione di tutti i Paesi bassi'^[5] includes him in a list of the greatest living musicians of his time. His first musical works were 'Chansons' published by Phalesius at Louvain, 1553–1554, and 'Il primo Libro de Madrigali e Canzoni francesi a cinque voci; Anversa, Huberto Waelrant e J. Latio, 1558.' It is remarkable however that of the numerous volumes of music which he published—Psalms, 'Cantiones Sacræ,' 'Jardin musiqual,' etc.—only two (of the 'Jardin') include compositions by himself. He seems in fact to have preferred to publish either by Tylman Susato or Phalesius. Seven of the collections of the latter contain works by Waelrant. One of these was also edited by him under the following title, 'Symphonia angelica di diversi eccellentissimi Musici, a quattro, cinque, e sei voci: Nuovamente raccolta per Uberto Waelrant, 1565.'^[6]

[ R. L. P. ]

WAERT, DE. [See Wert, de.]

WAGENSEIL, Georg Christoph, born Jan. 15, 1715, in Vienna, where he died March 1, 1777.^[7] He studied the clavier and organ with Wöger, and the science of composition with Fux and Palotta, the former of whom recommended him for a Court scholarship in 1736, and

1. The discovery of Waelrant's birthplace is due to the researches of M. A. Goovaerts, Histoire et Bibliographie de la Typographie musicale dans les Pays-bas, pp. 38–40, Antwerp 1880. A confusion with a namesake had led to the opinion previously universally accepted, that the musician was a native of Antwerp: see Fétis, s.v.; Mendel and Belssmann, Musikalisches Conversations-Lexikon, xi. 233, 2nd ed. 1880; and also E. vander Straeten, La Musique aux Pays-bas, iii. 201–204, 1875.
2. See F. Sweertius, Athenas Belgicæ p. 350, Antwerp 1628, folio; vander Straeten, i. 62, 1867; Mendel and Beissmann. xi. 234.
3. Goovaerts, p. 42.
4. Sweertius, l.c.
5. Page 42, ed. Antwerp. 1588 folio.
6. For the complete bibliography see the Goovaerts, p. 203–277.
7. He was thus in his 63rd year at the time of his death, and not 92 as Gerber states (vol. i.), and after him Fétis. Neither was he 85, at Burney supposed when be visited him in 1772.