ite 7, Passacaille.
HANDEL.]

It should be noticed that the three Handel quotations are all from the
same suite. We do not mean to infer that the above passages from
Handel are plagiarisms, but merely that the Kuhnau music was,
unconsciously, in his mind when he wrote them.

C.F. Becker, in his _Hausmusik in Deutschland_, has suggested that
these sonatas were known also to Mozart, and begs us to look on this
picture, the opening of a Vivace movement in Kuhnau's 6th Sonata:--

[Music illustration]

and on this, from _The Magic Flute_:--

[Music illustration]

Faisst, however, justly observes that though the harmonic basis is the
same in both, with Kuhnau the under-part is melody, whereas with
Mozart it is the reverse. He also accuses Becker--and justly, as
readers may see by turning to the passage in the _Zauberfloete_--of not
having represented the passage quite honestly. Reminiscence hunters
need to be very careful.

In these sonatas, as compared with the one in B flat, the thematic
material is of greater importance; and so, too, in the slow movements
the writing is simpler and more melodious.

The rapid rate at which they were composed deserves mention. Kuhnau
seems to have had the ready pen of a Schubert. In the preface to these
"Frische Fruechte" he says: "I wrote these seven sonatas straight off,
though attending at the same time to my duties (he was _juris
practicus_, also organist of St. Thomas'), so that each day one was
completed. Thus, this work, which I commenced on the Monday of one
week, was brought to an end by the Monday of the following week."

Kuhnau's second (and, so far as we know, last) set of sonatas bears
the following title:--

Musikalische Vorstellung
Einiger
Biblischer Historien
In 6 Sonaten
Auf dem Klavier zu spielen
Allen Liebhabern zum Vergnuegen
Verfueget
von
Johann Kuhnauen.

That is--

Musical Representation
of some
Bible Stories
In 6 Sonatas
To be performed on the Clavier
For the gratification of amateurs
Arranged
by
Johann Kuhnau.

Kuhnau was not the originator of programme-music. In the so-called
_Queen Elizabeth Virginal Book_,[46] in the Fitzwilliam Library, there
is a Fantasia by John Munday, who died 1630, in which there is given a
description of weather both fair and foul. Again, Froberger, who died
in 1667, is said to have been able, _on the clavier_, to describe
incidents, ideas, and feelings; there is, indeed, in existence a
battle-piece of his. An