Baini, who in the early part of this century was the successor in office of the great composer, being musical director of the papal choir at Rome, was probably the ablest and most enthusiastic student of the works of Palestrina that ever existed, and his great work, "_Memorie storicho-critiche della vita e delle opere di Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina_" (Rome, 1828. Two volumes), spite of a degree of partisanship and consequent lack of appreciation of the work of some of the Flemish composers, will probably always remain the bucket through which the waters of the well of Palestrina are best attainable. No man ever had as good opportunities of access to the master's works, and no one could have employed those opportunities better. He, with extreme exactness, classifies the works of the master into ten groups or styles. It would be both unnecessary and prolix to follow him through all of these; more practical for the general musician is the summing up of Hauptmann (whose essay is founded on Baini), who says, "Baini's ten styles may become bewildering to many, but three styles of composition may be readily recognized on close acquaintance with his works. In the first style he approaches the school of his predecessors the Netherlanders (the Flemish school), and this is shown to our ears by a lack of harmony; the melodies go on their course beside each other, without blending into harmonious unity; harmonically judged they are dry, heavy, and inflexible, and they are continuously canonic or fugated. The second style is, on the contrary, in simultaneous progressions, like our chorales. Here the voices are, as a matter of course, always singable, but the conditions of the melody are, as the harmonies of the preceding, rather negative, and the composer is not turned aside by any ill-sounding effects. The third style is the uniting of the foregoing two in the best and most beautiful manner that can be achieved in this sphere, and it is this school that has placed Palestrina in so high a rank for all time; in this style is the Mass of Pope Marcellus composed. There are however, beautiful specimens of the second style in existence, as, for example, the _Improperia_, which always refreshes me by its simplicity." In the use of chorale-like simplicity, Palestrina causes the commentator involuntarily to draw a comparison between him and John Sebastian Bach. The parallel could be drawn more closely than many of the ancient ones of Plutarch, for not only were both composers polyphonic in their musical vein, but both were actuated by the sincerest religious feeling in their largest compositions. Palestrina may stand as the typical Catholic, as Bach represents the earnest Protestant, in music.