Andrew received a good education, being intended for the church; but he was ultimately bound to Mr. James Potts, a printer in Dublin. Potts appears to have been very kind to young Cherry; and being partial to theatres, he generally took the lad with him there, finding that he had a strong turn in that direction. The printing-office was soon deserted by young Cherry for the stage, and at fourteen years of age he made his first appearance at a temporary theatre fitted up in James' Street. A manager of a strolling company induced Cherry and some other play-struck lads to join him, and with him Cherry continued for ten months, going through the provincial towns all the time, laboriously studying most of the principal characters in tragedy and comedy—half-starved, ill-lodged, and without a shilling in his pocket. At length he was reduced to the verge of starvation, and after four days' fasting the truant returned to his friends and his trade, to which he attended steadily for three years. Then the old passion came strong upon him, to which was added the passion of love; and so he enlisted under the management of Richard William Knipe as his master, and that of his daughter as his wife. Belfast was for a time the scene of his labour, where he acquired considerable reputation, and in 1797 he got an engagement in the Theatre Royal, Dublin, where his success was such as soon to place him at the top of his profession as a comic actor. Cherry accepted an engagement to play in the provinces in England, and returned to Dublin, where he wrote and produced two operatic pieces which were received with general approval. Leaving Ireland once more he went to Manchester, and thence to Bath, where his performance was pronounced to be "as finished a picture of the scenic art as had ever been performed on their boards." In 1802 he made his first appearance at Drury Lane, where he at once established a high character and position. In February, 1804, Cherry came out as a dramatic author by the production of "The Soldier's Daughter." This comedy had a run of thirty-five nights to crowded houses during the first season, and has kept the stage ever since. Though somewhat mawkish in sentiment and full of claptraps, it is nevertheless an effective piece, and affords opportunities for good acting. Its great popularity was in no small degree due to the acting of Mrs. Jordan as Widow Cheerly, a part afterwards sustained by Miss O'Neile at Covent Garden. In 1805 Cherry brought out "All for Fame," "The Village," and a musical interlude entitled "Spanish Dollars." The following year he produced "The Travellers," a grand operatic drama, the music of which was composed by Corri. He wrote a few other pieces, and continued to play in Drury Lane till it was burned; after which he took the management of a company that travelled through Wales, and of which Edmund Kean was the leading actor. He died at Monmouth on the 7th February, 1812, in his fiftieth year.—J. F. W.
CHERSIPHRON, the Cretan architect who designed the famous temple of Diana at Ephesus, and who, with his son Metagenes, determined the proportions of the Ionic order, flourished about 560 b.c. His writings were still extant in the time of Vitruvius.—J. S., G.
CHERUBINI, Maria Luigi Carlo Zenobio Salvator, a musician, was born at Florence, 14th September, 1760, and died at Paris, 3rd February, 1842. His father, Bartolo, taught him music when he was but six years old; three years later he began to study composition under Bartolo Felici and his son Alessandro, and upon their death, Bizzari, and subsequently Castrucci, were appointed his masters. The best evidence of his extremely early susceptibility of instruction, and of the successful result of the teaching he received, is the fact, that in 1773 he composed a mass, which is said to have possessed far more than boyish pretensions. This was followed by some other sacred works, and some light pieces for the theatre, of such merit as to draw upon the young artist the attention of the grand duke of Tuscany, who gave him a pension to enable him to pursue his studies under the famous Sarti. From 1778 till 1782, first at Bologna, and then at Milan, Cherubini received the lessons of this theorist, by which he was trained in the contrapuntal formula; of the severe Roman school—a discipline to which is to be attributed the earnest character and classic tendency of his writings. Sarti's instruction, however, was of a nature to develope his pupil's imagination, as much as to exercise his reason, and thus, so far as teaching might influence his genius, he owed to this master the best elements of his style. During his pupilage, he was often intrusted to write pieces for the minor characters in the operas of his master, which were produced without mention of his own name; and these were not of greater assistance to Sarti in saving his trouble, than of valuable service to Cherubini in exercising his invention while still under a teacher's direction. In 1780 Cherubini produced his first opera, "Quinto Fabio," which the censure of the time pronounced to be of a character too elaborate for its purpose—a criticism common to all works of art that aim above the applause of the million, and one which was a surety for the genuine artistic integrity of the career of which this opera was the commencement. Several other works of the same class were brought out by our composer in quick succession at different Italian cities, with such fortune, that in 1785 he was engaged as music director at the king's theatre in London. Here he wrote "La Finta Principessa" and "Giulio Sabino," and many additional pieces for the operas of other composers. In 1787 he made a sojourn at Paris, where he published some inconsiderable compositions, and then proceeded to Turin, where, early in the following year, he produced "Ifigenia in Aulide," the best accredited of his early operas. He returned to Paris in 1788, which place was from thenceforward his permanent abode.
Cherubini's artistic life assumed a new character from the period of his adopting France as a country, from which time, by writing for its establishments and to its language, and becoming an active member of its musical institutions, he influenced in a marked degree the progress of his art in that nation. "Démophon," his first French opera, was produced at the académie, 5th December, 1788; it had little success, partly because his style was new to the public, and above immediate appreciation; partly because Vogel, who had recently died, had left an unfinished opera on the same subject, of which the overture had obtained popularity; but Démophon stamped the character of its author, and gained him a high position in Parisian esteem. In 1789 Cherubini was engaged to direct an Italian opera at the Théatre de la Foire Germain, for which, as previously in London, he composed many pieces to be introduced in the different works that were brought out; these are noticed for the far greater lightness of their style than that in which he generally wrote; a proof of his capability to adapt his thoughts to the situation for which he conceived them. He made a most important success with "Lodoiska" in 1791, notwithstanding the rivalry of the opera of Kreutzer of the same name; this was the first of his works that has made a lasting impression. On the establishment of the conservatoire in 1795, Cherubini was appointed inspector, and also professor of composition, and in this capacity he has done more than perhaps any one in the establishment of a school of music peculiar to France. To pass over several compositions which are now less known, particular mention must be made of "Médée," produced in 1797 at the Théatre Feydeau. This opera underwent some subsequent alterations by the composer; it is now not unfrequently performed at Frankfort and Berlin, and the soundest judges declare it to be a masterpiece. "L'Hôtellerie Portugaise," the name of which is made familiar in England by its favourite overture, was first performed in 1798. The work upon which, above all others, the fame of Cherubini rests, "Les Deux Journées," was first performed at the Théatre Feydeau, 16th January, 1800. Though forgotten in France, this most beautiful opera is still, like several others of its author, a standard work at the principal German theatres, where, under the name of "Der Wasserträger," it ranks high in popular esteem and critical approval. In England little is known of it besides the overture; but this, by the power of its ideas, their admirable development, the peculiarity of its form, and the vigour and brilliancy of its orchestration, gives Cherubini a foremost rank among musicians, in the estimation of all who set the highest value on the greatest order of artistic productions. "Anacréon, ou l'Amour fugitif," an opera in two acts, the overture of which is here better known, and, far from justly, more admired than any other composition of Cherubini, was produced at the Théatre de l'Opera, 4th October, 1803. The success of his music in Germany, even then exceeding what it met with in Paris, led to his invitation to visit Vienna, where he went in July, 1805. There he reproduced at the imperial theatre his opera of "Lodoiska," with some additions, and he composed for the same establishment the eminently beautiful opera of "Faniska," which was brought out at the commencement of the ensuing year. Cherubini returned to Paris in the spring, but produced no work of importance there for some
