Rameau's Originality

Extract

Our fixture card tells us the main purpose of the lecture which M. Fédorov intended to give us this evening—‘A major point to be considered will be reasons for the decline and revival of Rameau's popularity’. Those words led us to expect evidence from periodicals published since 1764, and perhaps from concert programmes and theatre records. Few musicians could be better equipped for this task than the Librarian of the Paris Conservatoire, yet M. Féderov would not have promised ‘reasons’ for a decline and revival if he had intended to reveal only his literary discoveries without comment upon Rameau's measure of our common humanity, and upon changing taste in the arts. So while we lack M. Fédorov's researches, we may still undertake what he proposed as his ‘major point’. And that is why, though I have never embarked upon any study of Rameau worth calling research, I hope that nobody here will say ‘Sir, you presume!’ if I accept your Secretary's invitation.