And, curiously enough, this loose and somewhat commonplace tune introduces us to the greatest and most sincere of all English musicians (unless recent years have produced his peer) and to the song writer of whom, above all others, England has a right to be proud. This man was Henry Purcell. The tune of ‘Lilliburlero’ was written as an innocent dance in a book of virginal pieces and thence was brought into the open air to support the high spirits of the satiric verses. It is quite certain that Purcell never intended himself to be made immortal when he wrote it, or to be an instrument in the downfall of King James, to whom he wrote one of his many ‘odes.’ But into some of his other songs he put the best he had. They are graceful in the extreme, often decorated with the vocal turns and embellishments which were the fashion of the day, but never lacking in the musician’s touch. Their melodic facility is charming; their appropriateness to the spirit of the words is convincing; and their delicate architecture makes them, apart from their vocal quality, polished works of art. Purcell still frequently (and justly) appears on song programs. Among his many lyrics which are worth knowing we may mention ‘Full Fathom Five’ and ‘Come Unto These Yellow Sands,’ to Shakespeare’s words, and ‘I Attempt from Love’s Sickness to Fly.’ But after Purcell English music showed a falling off in originality and spontaneous quality which has astonished and mystified historians. And English song suffered the same fate along with the rest of English music. Vigorous semi-folk-songs date from the early eighteenth century--notably ‘Down Among the Dead Men,’ ‘The Vicar of Bray,’ and ‘Pretty Polly Oliver’--but as the century progressed the song output became more and more vapid and superficial in spirit. This was doubtless in part due to the vogue of Italian opera which held fashionable England fascinated and smothered the creative work of native composers. And as people became disgusted with the fad they turned to the next best thing at hand, the ‘ballad opera.’ This was not a very exalted form of art, but it was at least fresher and more musical than the exaggerated vocal virtuosity of opera, with its conventionalized arias and its ‘castrati,’ or male sopranos. The ballad opera came into fashion in 1727, with the enormous success of ‘The Beggar’s Opera,’ a success comparable to that of ‘Pinafore’ a century and a half later. The ballad opera was strictly not opera at all, but only a lively and merry farce (often suggesting the operetta librettos of Sir William Gilbert) interspersed with songs and duets. These songs were at first but popular melodies of the street or countryside, adapted to new words, assuring the popularity of the opera because the tunes were favorites. As the number of native tunes seemed insufficient to supply the enormous number of ballad operas, the writers engaged well-known musicians to write original tunes in