Faà di Bruno, Giovanni Matteo [Horatio, Orazio] 83

Filter [equalizer]

(Fr. filtre; Ger. Filter; It. filtro).

An electrical device that enables a sound to be shaped by amplifying or removing one or more areas of its total sound spectrum. The principal types of filter are: band-pass, band-reject (or notch), high pass, low pass and parametric. A band-pass filter retains or boosts the region or regions in which sound is to be passed, while the complementary band-reject filter eliminates only those that are to be rejected; these are defined in terms of independent bands, normally one octave, 2/3, ½ or 1/3 of an octave in width, which can be individually controlled in loudness by means of parallel slide controls (a form of band-pass filter, in which the removal of pitch bands is less complete, is known as a graphic equalizer, and is found in all types of mixing desks and in some domestic hi-fi equipment). High and low pass filters remove areas of the sound spectrum that are respectively below and above a selected cut-off frequency, with a single overall loudness control; the sharpness or roll-off at which this is applied can be adjusted by a response, bandwidth or ‘Q’ control, and in certain synthesizers this can be set so sharply on a low pass filter that it oscillates as a sine-wave at the cut-off frequency. The ‘wah-wah’ pedal (often associated with the Electric guitar) is a type of limited low pass filter. High and low pass filters are sometimes combined in a single unit; two such combination filters are prominent in Stockhausen's live electronic Mikrophonie I (1964). Parametric filters feature elements of all the types of filters described above; several subdivisions of the spectrum (typically three or four) can be independently filtered in terms of central frequency, loudness and response. Further details are given in T. Cary: Illustrated Compendium of Musical Technology (London, 1992), 187–90, 195–203.

HUGH DAVIES

Filtsch, Károly [Karl]

(b Szászsebes, Hungary [now Sebeş, Romania], 28 May 1830; d Venice, 11 May 1845). Hungarian pianist and composer of German descent. He was a child prodigy and his piano playing attracted great attention in Kolozsvár (now Cluj-Napoca) in 1835. Filtsch studied initially with his father, a Protestant pastor, and then in 1837 went to Vienna to study with Simon Sechter and August Mittag. On finishing his studies, Filtsch gave concerts in Vienna, Pest and Transylvania in 1841. These caused a sensation. He then left for Paris to study with Chopin and, when Chopin fell ill, with Liszt (1841–3). According to Lenz, Liszt said of him, ‘When that youngster goes travelling, I shall shut up shop’. In Paris he played Chopin’s concerto op.11 with the composer (11 January 1843), and appeared many times in private gatherings; in the same year in London (June–July) he played for Queen Victoria, with exceptional success. On his way home he gave numerous concerts in Vienna (November 1843 – March 1844) but he contracted tuberculosis and did not recover. Of his piano works, the Etude op.8 (dedicated to Ferenc Erkel) was published in Pest, while the Andante et Nocturne (1841) and Premières pensées musicales (1843) were published by Mechetti in Vienna.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

La Mara [M. Lipsius], ed.: Franz Liszt's Briefe, i (Leipzig, 1893), letter from Liszt to Filtsch, ?1842

W. von Lenz: Die grossen Pianoforte-Virtuosen unserer Zeit aus persönlicher Bekanntschaft (Berlin, 1872; Eng. trans., 1899/R)

B. Lindenau: ‘Carl Filtsch’, AMf, v (1940), 39–60

H. Tobie: ‘Carl Filtsch: ein Kapitel der Musikgeschichte Seibenbürgens’, Forschungen zur Volks- und Landeskund, xii/1 (1969), 37–48

K. Lachmund: Mein Leben mit Franz Liszt (Eschwege, 1970)

F. Gajewski: ‘New Chopiniana from the Papers of Carl Filtsch’, Studi musicali, xi (1982), 171–7

J. Fancsali: ‘Liszt Ferenc erdélyi tanítványai, i: Karl Filtsch’ [Franz Liszt’s Transylvanian pupils], Magyar zene, xxxiii (1992), 324–32, 437–44

DEZSŐ LEGÁNŸ

Final

(Lat. finalis).

The concluding scale degree of any melody said to be in a Mode. In the church modes, the final note of a melody came to be regarded, together with its Ambitus, as one of the two required determinants of the mode of that melody. In the earliest stages of the mutual adaptation of the eight-mode system and the repertory of Gregorian chant, the final degree of a melody did not have this overwhelming hegemony. Mode was originally an aural convenience that helped to control the melodic connection of an antiphon or responsory with its verse, as well as being a theoretical system of classification. In the practical domain of aural tradition the final of an antiphon was not as important as its incipit, since it was by the pattern of the antiphon's beginning that the choice of its Difference, or manner of ending, was governed; but for responsories and their verses the final of the responsory did have a bearing on the verse. This is attested in passages from the tenth chapter of Aurelian's Musica disciplina (c840–50) and the second chapter of Regino's Epistola (c901) (see W. Apel: Gregorian Chant, Bloomington, IN, 1958, 3/1966/R, 174). The first treatise in which the final is the over-riding modal criterion is the anonymous Dialogus de musica of about 1000 (GerbertS, i, 257, trans. in StrunkSR2, ii).

In the modal theory of Hermannus Contractus and his followers, notably Wilhelm of Hirsau (d 1091), the term exitus cantilenae, ‘end of the melody’, was used (GerbertS, ii, 128 and 175; see also GerbertS, ii, 58), but unlike the term ‘final’ as it came to be understood, it had no connotation of structural governance, since in Hermannus's tetrachordal theory modality was conceived and analysed in terms of the melodic position of notes in the entire tone system rather than in terms of the hierarchy of tones within a melody.

The near synonymity of ‘final’ and Tonic has remained a pervasive notion in Western musical culture, although many scholars working in non-Western music, folk music and even early polyphony have begun to see this notion as a cultural assumption rather than an inherent connection.

HAROLD S. POWERS