The Birth of the Orchestra by John Spitzer;Neal Zaslaw;

Author:John Spitzer;Neal Zaslaw; [Zaslaw;, John Spitzer;Neal]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780195189551
Publisher: OxfordUP
Published: 2004-09-15T05:00:00+00:00

FIG. 8.3a. A concert at Bath in the 1790s

FIG. 8.3b. A ball at Bath in the 1790s

Edinburgh and Dublin, as historic capitals, tried to maintain musical institutions modeled on those of London. Dublin had two standing orchestras, the Lord Lieutenant’s orchestra, whose members held government appointments like the King’s Band, and a theater orchestra in Smock Alley, later at the Crow Street theater. The leader of the Lord Lieutenant’s orchestra from 1716 to 1727 was J. S. Kusser, one-time Kapellmeister at Stuttgart and Lullist apostle in Germany (see Ch. 7).

Anglicized now as John Cousser, he composed an ode each year for the birthday of the English monarch. In addition he led the theater orchestra, whose personnel overlapped with that of the Lord Lieutenant’s orchestra. Cousser at one point seems to have been in charge of the theater’s finances too, for in his commonplace book he projected expenses and income in charmingly phonetic English:

1. The nights charge of ye Playhouse in Dublin, is about five pounds odd money.

2. A weeks Salary for their Servants, &c: is three pounds ten or twelfe Shillings.

3. Boxes therein keeps at ye most 80. Tikets. The Pit 150. Tikets: The Gallerie 200 Tikets.

There were also seats backstage, but “tikets” for them proved impossible to control:

4. Behind ye Stage, suppose, there should be five pounds, which is impossible because ye players lett inn, a whole trieb of perrewig makers, with their wifes, Daughters & friends, & sever–

al others of their own acquaintance upon written Tikets for ye Use of Perewigs & other

necessairies for ye play.”137

By 1748 Smock Alley boasted an orchestra of 22, larger than any other English provincial town (Table 8.3).

Many of the Dublin instrumentalists came from London, usually for only a season or two, arousing a certain degree of resentment from Dublin’s resident musicians. 138 Dublin’s pleasure gardens, the Rotunda Gardens, were owned and operated by the Lying—In Hospital and employed a standing orchestra of 18–20 musicians, which gave three concerts a week from April to September.139 During the winter months, the Charitable Musical Society for the Release of Imprisoned Debtors put on a series of subscription concerts, which in some years employed the entire orchestra of the Smock Alley Theatre.140 Finally, there were the orchestras of amateur musical societies, which in Dublin seem to have operated without the aid of professionals. Lord Mornington’s Musical Academy, founded in 1757, stipulated in its bylaws: “No public mercenary performer, professor, or teacher of music shall ever be admitted into any rank of the Academy on any account whatsoever.”141

In Edinburgh the Musical Society was composed of both amateurs and professionals, and for much of the eighteenth century it constituted the center of the town’s elegant musical activities. Founded in 1728, the Society limited its membership at first to 70; later the enrollment was increased to 100, then to 130, finally in the 1770s to 170.

It gave weekly concerts and maintained a large music library.142 Because Edinburgh was far from London, professional instrumentalists were not so readily available as

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