Music and the Benefit Performance in Eighteenth-Century Britain

Reveals how the musical benefit allowed musicians, composers, and audiences to engage in new professional, financial, and artistic contexts.

Matthew Gardner (Edited by), Alison DeSimone (Edited by)

9781108730150, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 23 June 2022

302 pages, 2 b/w illus. 6 tables 6 music examples
24.3 x 16.8 x 1.5 cm, 0.53 kg

In the early eighteenth century, the benefit performance became an essential component of commercial music-making in Britain. Benefits, adapted from the spoken theatre, provided a new model from which instrumentalists, singers, and composers could reap financial and professional rewards. Benefits could be given as theatre pieces, concerts, or opera performances for the benefit of individual performers; or in aid of specific organizations. The benefit changed Britain's musico-theatrical landscape during this time and these special performances became a prototype for similar types of events in other European and American cities. Indeed, the charity benefit became a musical phenomenon in its own right, leading, for example, to the lasting success of Handel's Messiah. By examining benefits from a musical perspective - including performers, audiences, and institutions - the twelve chapters in this collection present the first study of the various ways in which music became associated with the benefit system in eighteenth-century Britain.

Introduction Alison DeSimone and Matthew Gardner
Part I. Musical Benefits in the London Theatre: Networks and Repertories: 1. Risks and rewards: benefits and their financial impact on actors, authors, singers, and other musicians in London, c. 1690–1730 Kathryn Lowerre
2. With several entertainments of singing and dancing: London Theatre benefits, 1700–1725 Olive Baldwin and Thelma Wilson
3. Concertos 'upon the stage' in early Hanoverian London: the instrumental counterpart to opera Seria Robert G. Rawson
4. Cobblers, country fairs, and cross-dressing: benefits and the development of ballad opera Vanessa Rogers
Part II. Beyond London: Mimicry or Originality?: 5. Benefit concerts in the North of England: more than just musical entertainment Roz Southey
6. Amateur music-making, professional musicians, and benefit concerts in Edinburgh Stefanie Acquavella-Rauch
7. English music in benefit concerts: Henry Purcell and the next generation Amanda Eubanks Winkler
8. Strategies of performance: benefits, professional singers, and Italian opera in the early eighteenth century Alison DeSimone
Part IV. Charity Benefits: 9. The Mercer's Hospital Charity Services: music charity in eighteenth-century Dublin Tríona O'Hanlon
10. English Oratorio and charity benefits in mid-eighteenth-century London Matthew Gardner
Part V. The Role of the Audience: 11. Encountering 'the most extraordinary prodigy': meeting Master Mozart in Georgian London John Irving
12. Benefits: Cui Bono? David Hunter.

Subject Areas: Opera [AVGC9], Classical music [c 1750 to c 1830 AVGC4], Baroque music [c 1600 to c 1750 AVGC3], Theory of music & musicology [AVA], Theatre direction & production [ANF]