The Ballad-Singer in Georgian and Victorian London

An in-depth study of the nineteenth-century London ballad-singer, a central figure in British cultural, social and political life.

Oskar Cox Jensen (Author)

9781108821087, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 9 March 2023

298 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.5 cm, 0.44 kg

'Oskar Cox Jensen is currently one of the most insightful and prolific scholars of the ballad, and his latest book, The Ballad-Singer in Georgian and Victorian London, is a welcome addition to the field. By focusing on ballad-singers themselves, an understudied group, Jensen adds new dimensions to scholarly understanding of the place ballad-singers held in society … this is a well-researched, well-written, creative, and original book that has much to offer students of ballad history. The website with recorded songs that accompany it is an added bonus that will bring pleasure to readers.' Robin Ganev, Journal of British Studies

For three centuries, ballad-singers thrived at the heart of life in London. One of history's great paradoxes, they were routinely disparaged and persecuted, living on the margins, yet playing a central part in the social, cultural, and political life of the nation. This history spans the Georgian heyday and Victorian decline of those who sang in the city streets in order to sell printed songs. Focusing on the people who plied this musical trade, Oskar Cox Jensen interrogates their craft and their repertoire, the challenges they faced and the great changes in which they were caught up. From orphans to veterans, prostitutes to preachers, ballad-singers sang of love and loss, the soil and the sea, mediating the events of the day to an audience of hundreds of thousands. Complemented by sixty-two recorded songs, this study demonstrates how ballad-singers are figures of central importance in the cultural, social, and political processes of continuity, contestation, and change across the nineteenth-century world.

List of Figures
List of Musical Examples
List of Recordings
List of Tables
Acknowledgements
Note on the Text
List of Abbreviations
Introduction
1. Representations: Seeing the Singer
Interlude I. 'Oh! Cruel'
2. Progress: Ancient Custom in the Modern City
Interlude II. 'Lord Viscount Maidstone's Address'
3. Performance: The Singer in Action
Interlude III. 'The Storm'
4. Repertoire: Navigating the Mainstream
Interlude IV. 'Old Dog Tray'
Conclusion
Bibliography.

Subject Areas: British & Irish history [HBJD1], Literary studies: c 1800 to c 1900 [DSBF], Folk & traditional music [AVGH]