Theatre Music Archive

Reflection on the Collection

It has been a truly unique experience having the opportunity to work on these scores since December last year. Admittedly the last few months of archiving have proven a challenge since the completion of the Pantomimes, but there are now many plays, ballets and operas archived. A particularly interesting item was sheet music of 'God Save the Queen' from the opening of Crystal Palace, that would have been performed before Queen Victoria herself! Something that has proved difficult throughout, is the challenge of deciphering Victorian handwriting; it is truly an art to understand some of the long, elaborate scribbles sometimes!

One of the tasks of working with this collection has been the removal of any metal pins and clasps keeping the paper together. Depending on the type of metal, some of the pins have corroded away and in some cases, damaged the paper it is embedded in. This is the amount I have removed from around 4 months of work:

 
It’s interesting to see how some of the pins are still in excellent condition (also very sharp!) and others have completely turned to rust.

It saddens me that due to the need to thoroughly investigate the origin of scores, I've not been able to see the collection archived to completion, though the majority has been catalogued. I’m now moving on to a different area in the Library, but hopefully it won’t be long before the Drury Lane Collection is completed.

And so I leave you with a picture of a Victorian gentleman in a Lady's hat.

 

 

 

The Mystery Watermark

I am continuing work on the second part of the collection, and have now completed the scores written for Pantomimes and moved on to plays, ballets and songs. The main frustration with this section of the collection is the amount of information provided on the scores by the Victorians, or rather, lack of. In some cases, there is nothing but the music on the paper and it is scores such as these that require more investigation. Many of the scores written for plays were created to accompany the work of Dion Boucicault, who rose to fame in the world of playwrights for successes such as 'Arrah-na-Pogue' and 'The Colleen Bawn', both of which were scored by Oscar Barrett. 

It is in one of these scores for a production called 'The Fortunes of Nigel' that I've found what seems to be a totally anachronistic piece of paper. Though it was found keeping together a set of pages, upon being held up to the light, it reveals an unusual secret.

 Though the paper is very similar to the standard of that it was found with, the year 1591 and the name 'Elizabeth R' are clearly visible, set into the weave of the paper. On the other half of the sheet, there were also three initials, 'J.D. & C.'. So what is it doing there? If it is from the Victorian times, why the watermark? If it's from Elizabethan times, what's it doing in these scores with such well preserved paper? As well as continuing work on the scores, I'm trying to find out anything I can about this strange piece of paper. Any ideas are appreciated!

First part of collection archived

Part 1 of project completed!
 
The description of the King's Theatre Archive of music manuscripts is now complete and has just been published on  the British Library's online catalogue 'Search our Catalogues - Archives and manuscripts'.
http://www.bl.uk/reshelp/findhelprestype/catblhold/all/allcat.html 
 
The scores, orchestral parts and vocal scores relating to 74 operas produced c1795-1860 can now be explored in detail. Included are descriptions of the sources for the earliest English productions of operas by Rossini, Donizetti and Verdi. Singers' and instumentalists' names which appear on the parts have also been included, as well as indications of the presence of annotations and stage directions.
 
The collection is available for consultation in the British Library's Rare Books and Music Reading Room at St Pancras, London.

 

 

 

Next blog: A mystery watermark.

From the Minds of Victorian Musicians

One of my favourite things about working on this collection is the varied amount of artwork scattered through out the scores. Not artwork that was intended to be there, but doodles created by the musicians during the long practices for the shows. Having played in orchestras for years myself, I am familiar with the frustrations of being in a section of the orchestra that has to patiently wait while the conductor concentrates on other areas. To tackle this, some of the musicians from the days of Oscar Barret took to drawing to entertain themselves. The results are interesting illustrations of costumes, humorous caricatures of fellow artists and some... well, some I'm not sure what they are, exactly.

Enjoy! Click on the picture to see a more detailed version.

 
'Always haunt me in my dreams' From Little Red Riding Hoot, 1886

'Where did you get that hat' Jack and the Beanstalk, 1884

Dick Whittington, 1890, Clarinet part (can you tell?)

Dick Whittington, 1890

Dick Whittington, 1890

From 'Dick Whittington, 1890

Transformation music, year unkown

A sketch of the composer, Oscar Barrett

It is interesting to see what can be learned from some of these doodle. The Bassoonist who performed in  'Dick Whittington' at the New Olypmic Theatre in 1893 seemed to hold a grudge against someone called 'Joe Groves' who he was meeting in the 'drawing room' on the 9th of March, 1893. These are the strange forms he draws him in. The one that includes the huge head could indicate Groves was rather full of himself, perhaps!

 
' Groves'

'Groves'

'This is Groves'

'Groves'

I must say, I'm very curious to know what it was that Joe Groves must have done to have irritated the bassoonist so much that he created these pictures. A secret lost to time, alas.

To see more, check out the Theatre Archives Flickr Page here.

The History of Pantomime - Part 2

When looking at the history of Pantomime it is important to acknowledge the presence of the famous clown Joe Grimaldi, often referred to as ‘The King of Clowns’. He is remembered as one of the greatest clownists of all time. He is thought to be responsible for the introduction of the Pantomime Dame and, beginning the tradition of audience participation and as being the father of the modern clown. He achieved great success in ‘Harlequin Mother Goose or The Golden Egg’ on the stage of the Theatre of Covent Garden, becoming famed for his song ‘Hot Codlins’ which audiences would demand him to perform. He was known to be skilled in the art of what was called ‘tricks on construction’ and was the first to make extensive use of the catchphrase, his most famous one being ‘Here we are again!’ forerunner of the famous ‘It’s behind you!’ and ‘Oh no it isn’t!’ etc.  He dramatically changed the way the characters in the Harlequinade were represented, shifting the remaining aspects of buffoonery and slapstick from Harlequin to Clown. However, during his forties there was a decline in theatregoers due to a recession and Grimaldi’s life was to end with him penniless at the age of 59 in 1837. London mourned the loss of such a great performer and Charles Dickens wrote of him: “The clown left the stage with Grimaldi and though often heard of, has never since been seen”.

 Joe Grimaldi, the famous clown

It was after the death of Grimaldi that the Harlinquinade was to lose the grip it once held over London audiences (though Harlequin and Clown would remain important figures for years) and the theatre would enter into the Golden Age of Victorian Pantomime. What had begun as simply the ‘speaking opening’ before the (mostly) mute Harlequinde began to over take the entire show Developments in technology allowed for the Victorians to include astonishing special effects to wow audiences and fill seats. Influences of Burlesques mingled with the characteristic remains of the Harlequinade, ‘Burlesque’ referring to its original form of satire and parody rather than the shows of fishnets, fans and strip tease that it has morphed into in more recent times. Fairy tales, caricature and most importantly, comedy, were combined and the pantomime began to take on the form of what we recognise today.

Pantomime poster for 'Jack and the Beanstalk'

It is from this period in history that our collection at the British Library originates. A large portion of the scores in the collection (and all of the scores that I have seen so far) are the work of Oscar Barrett, proprietor, manager, composer and producer of pantomimes in various theatres in London and other British cities, who worked in the second half of the 1800s. He sought to bring the Pantomime closer to the stories on which they were based whilst still containing the spectacle and entertainments that people expected of them. A fascinating interview with him from April 1894 with the New York Times can be found here which gives us an insight into his life as a Pantomime expert and into how its form was changing at the time.

For me, it is very interesting to know a little more about the man behind the productions, whose scores I am working with and also to know more of the history of this tradition that goes back further than I imagined and is still a thriving art form today.

The History of Pantomime - Part 1

I’d like to dedicate this blog post to looking back at Pantomime itself and present you with a brief guide to its history, also significant events and characters that shaped it into its recognisable modern form.

The nature of pantomime stems from the ‘Harlequin’ character who first appeared in Italian Commedia dell’arte in the 1500s as Alecchino as a stupid, gluttonous, lusty, cowardly buffoon. Originally accompanied by a set of characters including ‘Brighella’ (a figure to later become the Pierrot Clown character) who formed something of a double act with Alecchino, a female character who admired Alecchino  whose name was to settle as Columbina, and Pulcinella, a hump backed, hook nosed soldier who we can still see in the form of ‘Mr Punch’ from the Punch and Judy shows seen on British sea sides.

 One of the British Library's statues of Punch 

These characters would later form the basis of the ‘Harlequinade’  This form of entertainment was hugely popular through out Europe, ranging as far as Moscow, though when it came to England during the reign of King Charles I, it did not go down well at all, partly due to the Puritan atmosphere in England at the time. Writer of the time, Thomas Brande, describes how the audience did not take to the female performers that features, writing ‘Glad am I to say they were hissed, hooted and pippin-pelted from the stage…I do not think they will soon be ready to try the same again’. However, the art had been known to have briefly appeared in the court of Queen Elizabeth I at Kenilworth Gardens, at a cost of around £1000 a day.

 A typical costume of Harlequin

As the years and the attitude in England progressed, the character of Alecchino returned to Britain and evolved into Harlequin, leaving behind more of the negative aspects of his character, becoming a more cunning, witty mischievous figure and given the aspect of magic by John Rich, of 18th century London

Rich is considered the father of British pantomime. He was an important theatre director and producer of ‘spectacles’ (as his shows were called) in 18th century London, founding the New Theatre at Lincoln’s Inn Fields (1714) and the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden (1732). Rich was also a performer himself, playing a mute Harlequin from 1717 – 1760 using the stage name of ‘Lun’. It was in 1724 that his show ‘The Necromancer, or History of Dr. Faustus’ proved to be a big hit with the capital and Pantomime became a popular art form. It was at this time that the word Pantomime was first used commercially and in its classical sense- Pantomimus – imitator of all, used to describe an actor who played five characters, later broadened to encapsulate this new form of entertainment. Originally, the show would be split into two halves, one serious and the other comical, infused with ‘gay scenes, fine habits, grand dances, appropriate music and other decorations’.

Next blog: Harlequinade & Pantomime in the 1800s, Joe Grimaldi and Burlesque

New Cataloguer - First Impressions

A hello to readers of this blog old and new! I'm Hannah Clark, guest writer for the Theatre Music Archives blog. I've recently taken over from Caroline Shaw in archiving the Drury Lane collection and will be writing about the second half of the collection as I work through it. After a week of getting to grips with the project, I'd like to reflect my thoughts and first impressions.

I am finding working on a collection such as this fascinating. The faded paper harks back to a time when orchestral writing was a painstaking process, the effort for each production reflected in the masses of music needed for each pantomime. There is a joy in seeing the hand written scores, created a good century before music programmes such as Sibelius allowed composers to hear and edit their creations at will. The style of notation, accompanied by the beautiful swirling Victorian handwriting conjures images of gentlemen in top hats, gas lamps and grand music halls.

This is helped by some of the delightful doodles that appear, also seen on scores in other productions, highlighted in Caroline's earlier post. I have collected a few of the finest and funniest that I have come across while archiving scores for the pantomimes ‘Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves’ and ‘Jack & The Beanstalk’

 

 

An important part of archiving this series is validating the date from which a score originates (as unfortunately they do not allow measurement of how dirty your hands get, how musty the smell is, or how many times you sneeze as valid methods of dating an item here at the British Library).

Sometimes an item will come with no date, or information about where it was performed, only the title. To achieve a complete and useful catalogue entry, some investigating is often needed to obtain the information. One such item was a set of four scripts, on which the first page contained something that looked quite out of place on paper over 100 years old…

 

It was the @ symbol that jumped out at me, and ultimately helped me date the item. There were two clear dates that Jack and the Beanstalk was performed in London, a set of scores from a 1884 -85 production at Crystal Palace, another  in 1893 - 94 and one at the Borough Theatre Stratford in 1902 – 03. Though we think of the @ symbol as a product of modern times, it first appearing in the digital world in emails in the 1970s, it is a symbol that dates back to far earlier. Some argue that it dates back to the 6th or 7th century, used in Latin as an abbreviation for ‘at’ - though this is widely debated. It has been seen clearly on Swedish manuscripts dating from 1674, and it appeared on the first typewriter produced in 1885. Therefore, my script could only have come from after that date, and after further research I validated it as accompanying the 1902 – 03 production. A fun bit of investigating in which I learned something interesting as well.

The next sets of scores lined up for me are from Little Red Riding Hood. It seems fitting to be working on Pantomimes at this time of year!

Cinderella's motor car

Despite everything I've read about the spectacle, realism and topicality of Harris's stage productions, I couldn't quite believe the assertion by W Macqueen Pope that in 1895 Cinderella arrived at the Ball by car ('Pillars of Drury Lane', 1955). But a newspaper preview confirms it:

'Sir Augustus Harris's Cinderella carriage in his new pantomime at Drury-lane will be quite 'up to date'. The carriage, which will be horseless, is designed by Messrs Jackson, of Rathbone-place, and is built by Messrs Windover. It will be illuminated by over five hundred electric lamps...' ('The Era', 30 November 1895).

The Penny Illustrated Paper of 28 December has a drawing of the electric coach, with the remark that 'Science' is 'the veritable Fairy Godmother of to-day'!

No picture of the coach in the archive, but the music which accompanied it is there, and a little investigation would reveal exactly what it was. It must come soon after this:

 
Number 47, 1st violin, 'Cinderella' of 1895. Fairy Godmother's cue '...Provide you with a servant. Ah! the cat will do'.

 
Orchestral parts, 'Cinderella' of 1895. Bound with strings and buttons.

Digitised theatre ephemera

The purpose of this post is to highlight some online digitised collections which relate to the Theatre Music Archives. Items such as playbills and programmes can provide a context for our musical scores.

Recently launched, the online John Johnson Collection provides access to thousands of items selected from the John Johnson Collection of Printed Ephemera at the Bodleian Library, Oxford. 'Nineteenth century entertainment' is one of its categories, and it contains, for example, a programme of Pettitt and Harris's Drury Lane play 'Pluck' of 1882, which gives a complete cast list and synopsis of scenes. The John Johnson Collection is available free of charge via UK schools, universities, further education institutions and public libraries.

These items can be viewed in conjunction with similar material in the British Library's Evanion Collection, freely available through our website. For example, this playbill with photographs of scenes from 'Hand and Glove' at the Grecian Theatre, 1874.

Another wonderful resource is the East London Theatre Archive. This is a thematic database of digitised East London theatre ephemera whose physical versions are held at various places including the V&A Museum and University of East London Archives. In this collection I found a word book for the pantomime 'Babes in the Wood' at Borough Theatre, Stratford, 1901, and lots of playbills for plays at the Grecian Theatre. (These East London theatres feature prominently in our Drury Lane collection because of the Oscar Barrett connection).

The Harris era

Augustus Harris took over the management of Drury Lane Theatre in 1879, in the same year as Oscar Barrett began to work there. He maintained the variety of genres, producing drama, opera and pantomime. It was common theatre knowledge that 'serious' drama didn't make money, but Harris was enterprising. He opened with Shakespeare's 'Henry V' but produced it as a spectacle, making much of military and battle scenes, filling the stage with horses, weapons and banners. Newly written plays followed, 'The World', 'Youth', 'Pluck' and 'Freedom'. These were huge productions with spectacular, beautiful and realistic effects. There seems to have been no limit to what could be put on stage: real bulls in 'Carmen', and not just horses on stage but a staged horse race in 'The Prodigal daughter'! (1892).

A season of German opera was given in 1882, conducted by Hans Richter. The Carl Rosa Opera seasons began in 1883, when 'Esmerelda' and 'Columba', two new operas, were performed.

But Harris was most famous for his pantomimes, of which he produced seventeen. It is this pantomime music that features most prominently in our collection. The first one was 'Bluebeard', with music by Frederick Wallenstein (opened 26 Dec 1879). Then came 'Robinson Crusoe' (1881/82), 'Sindbad' (1882/83), 'Cinderella' (1883/84) and many others. Another of Harris's good ideas was to exploit the popularity of music hall by employing its performers in his pantomimes, much as theatres today use TV celebrities and soap stars.

Bust of Augustus Harris at Drury Lane Theatre. Erected after his death in 1896. Image from Wikimedia Commons.