Page:The story of the flute (IA storyofflute1914fitz).djvu/275

Sidney Lanier

was a tall, handsome man, born in Macon, Georgia, and descended from the Huguenot family of famous musicians (including several flautists) in the service of Charles I. and Charles II. of England. OnSidney
Lanier the outbreak of the war between North and South, Lanier enlisted in the Confederate Army, and he took part in several battles. When taken prisoner he hid his flute up his sleeve, and by its means gained the favour of his gaolers. In 1874 he joined the Peabody orchestra in Baltimore, and devoted himself to music and literature, becoming Professor of English in the John Hopkins University. Lanier composed music to several of his own poems, and wrote a novel and several important works on literary subjects. He is said to have produced strange violin effects from his flute.

Asger Hamerik, the director of the Peabody orchestra, says of Lanier's flute-playing: "In his hands the flute no longer remained a mere material instrument, but was transformed into a voice that set heavenly harmonies into vibration. Its tones developed colours, warmth, and a low sweetness of unspeakable poetry. . . . His playing appealed alike to the musically learned and to the unlearned—for he would magnetize the listener." Lanier had a firm belief in a great future for the flute; he said: "The time is not far distant when the twenty violins of a good orchestra will be balanced by twenty flutes." Here is how he speaks of the instrument in his poem The Symphony:—

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