f Berlioz, for two choirs; of Purcell,
for St. Cecilia's Day; of Dr. Blow and Dr. Croft, with accompaniments of
two violins, two trumpets, and bass; and the magnificent Utrecht and
Dettingen Te Deums of Handel. Among those by contemporary writers are
Macfarren's, written in 1884, and Sullivan's, commemorating the recovery
of the Prince of Wales.

The Magnificat, or Song of the Virgin, is part of the vesper service of
the Church, and has been treated by all the old Church composers of
prominence both in plain chant and in polyphonic form. In the English
cathedral service it is often richly harmonized, and Bach, Mozart,
Handel, Mendelssohn and others have set it in oratorio style with
complete orchestral accompaniment.

[1] Born at Florence in the year 1515, and famous as the founder of the
Congregation of the Fathers of the Oratory.

BACH.

Johann Sebastian Bach, the most eminent of the world's organ-players and
contrapuntists, was born at Eisenach, March 21, 1685, and was the most
illustrious member of a long line of musicians, the Bach family having
been famous almost from time immemorial for its skill in music. He first
studied the piano with his brother, Johann Christoph, and the organ with
Reinecke in Hamburg, and Buxtehude in Luebeck. In 1703 he was court
musician in Weimar, and afterwards was engaged as organist in Arnstadt
and Muehlhausen. In 1708 he was court organist, and in 1714 concert-master
in Weimar. In 1718 he was chapel-master to the Prince von Koethen, and in
1723 was appointed music-director and cantor at the St. Thomas School in
Leipsic,--a position which he held during the remainder of his life. He
has left for the admiration of posterity an almost endless list of vocal
and instrumental works, including chorales, motets, magnificats, masses,
fugues, and fantasies, especially for organ and piano, the "Christmas
Oratorio," and several settings of the passion, of which the most famous
are the "St. John" and "St. Matthew," the latter of which Mendelssohn
introduced to the world in 1829, after it had slumbered an entire
century. His most famous instrumental work is the "Well-tempered
Clavichord,"--a collection of forty-eight fugues and preludes, which was
written for his second wife, Anna Magdalena Bach, to whom also he
dedicated a large number of piano pieces and songs. His first wife was
his cousin, Maria Barbara Bach, the youngest daughter of Johann Michae