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Italian composer, virtuoso pianist, teacher, and music publisher (1752–1832) who became a leading figure in the development of piano technique. Based largely in England, he famously competed with Mozart in 1781 and later influenced generations of pianists and composers, including Beethoven. Complete four-volume set of Muzio Clementi’s Selection of Practical Harmony, for the Organ or Piano Forte, published in London by Clementi and his partners between 1801 and circa 1815. The four volumes are bound as two books in matching red cloth and leather bindings with gilt-decorated spines and marbled endpapers, both 13.25 x 9.5. The first book contains Volumes I and II, and the second contains Volumes III and IV. Affixed to the reverse of the title page of Volume I is a clipped autograph presentation inscription in Clementi’s hand, “Mr. Banks from the Author.” The title pages describe the work as a selection of voluntaries, fugues, canons, and other pieces by eminent composers, prefaced by Clementi’s Epitome of Counterpoint. The spines are lettered “Clementi / Practical Harmony / Vols 1–2” and “Clementi / Practical Harmony / Vols 3–4,” with the latter dated 1810. In very good condition, with scattered foxing and toning to the pages, and considerable wear, rubbing, and losses to the bindings, particularly along the spines and edges. The front and back boards of the first book are separated from the spine but remain attached to the text block, and the front board of the second book is similarly separated from the spine but remains attached; the back board of the second book remains securely attached.
Clementi’s Selection of Practical Harmony was an ambitious anthology intended to provide keyboard players and students with examples of contrapuntal writing by earlier and contemporary masters. Issued in four volumes over a period beginning in 1801, the work brings together fugues, canons, voluntaries, and other compositions by figures including Handel, Mozart, Scarlatti, Albrechtsberger, and several members of the Bach family. Particularly significant is the inclusion in Volume I of Johann Sebastian Bach’s Pièce d’Orgue, BWV 572, alongside a group of his keyboard dance movements. Clementi’s anthology formed part of his sustained interest in the study and preservation of earlier keyboard music at a time when much of this repertoire remained difficult to obtain in print.
