Public Festival - Private Auditoria

Public festival - Private auditoria : Private patronage of music and performance in England 1580 – 1900.

There continued an English tradition of banquet festivities in the town and city, which had begun much earlier in the shires (M. Girouard, 1978) as a cycle of season and harvest festivals.

Such habits became urbane during the sixteenth century in the flourishing guild halls, noble wedding festivities, the principal feast days of Shrove Tuesday, Michaelmas and Twelfth Night become established in an urban culture developing around recognised holidays and new socio-political alliances.

The inclusion of music would be a continuing expectation, however, an English language culture was in development since the printing press, which allowed this new English literature to spread among those who were also versed in Latin and the classical authors.

Writers of verse included the nobility and those prominent in an expanding culture were Sir Philip Sidney and Edmund Spencer, William Shakespeare, John Fletcher and Francis Beaumont.

Choosing one of the popular festivals as a subject (by accepting

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a commission for such an occasion) was a favourite literati device, lending the works to performance in the Festival again, and again. Such an example is that of A Midsummer Nights Dream in the Middle Temple hall c.1595 (figure 1) for the festivities at a wedding celebration.

Figure 1 - Middle Temple hall with outline of a banquet stage setting.

Regular use of temporary structures and the staging required was to become part of a culture moving from the (at times raucous) open-air public performance towards the seclusion of an invited audience. A banquet provided the setting for a well-read audience and a more suitable auditorium for musical accompaniments.

Without impinging on the inherited fabric of

a guild hall or hall of the Inns of Court, temporary staging was again employed for festivities at the Middle Temple hall (1602) on ‘Twelfth Night’.

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Thus performance becomes a regular provision as an expected show of hospitality, a key figure arranged and commissioned suitable construction in the hall.

Bulstrode Whitelocke according to Leslie Hotson (1928) was

appointed by the Society of the Middle Temple in the capacity of Master of the Revels (1628) and a tradition is reflected in such an appointment.

With the influence of Inigo Jones at Court, and through the continued practice of John Webb (his son-in-law) the staging and setting of performances became a regular arrangement of flats and backcloths such as those prepared for Sir William Davenant and shown below (figure 2). Accommodated in form and scale to one end of the dining hall for an audience invited to Rutland House, on Charterhouse Yard.

This was to be come a typology

for stage auditoria in the nineteenth century.

In addition to a preference for this more private, invited occasion, the guilds and nobility were affected during the seventeenth century by two other factors.

The first was the continuation of Court festivities in this era

by James I, becoming an ever more luxurious (R. Strong, 1998) example few would attempt to rival. emulation.

Nevertheless, this a high culture encouraged

Secondly, in subsequent years the unrest of civil war brought

organised discouragement in the 1642 legislation (L. Hotson, 1928) against public performances.

Paradoxically perhaps, both factors tend to encourage

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the development towards a private or invited audience for festivities.

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guild or noble host reduced the risk of disruption by inviting influential guests, choosing to present works of deemed merit or worth.

In this

way recital and staged performances developed at Holland House (figure 3) Kensington (1647), at a

Figure 2 - Proscenium stage, Rutland House.

liberal arts Academy started by Sir Balthazar Gerbier (from 1649 onwards) with Thomas Bruce, Earl of Elgin at St John’s Hall, Clerkenwell (until sometime c.1656) and at Sir William Davenant’s Rutland House, (figure 2) in Charterhouse Yard (1656).

Occasional rehearsals at the Apothecaries

Figure 3 Holland House, Kensington.

Figure 4 The Apothecaries Hall.

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Hall, (figure 4) Blackfriars ( for example during 1656) may have offered the guild a ‘Review’ without expense 'extra' to their own performances.

Through such developments a preference for suitable auditoria continued, with a yet more elaborate development on the continent. English society, however, was not adverse to well built and appointed boxes (when public performance regained a recognition and became accepted) in some of the refurbished or new public venues (e.g. the new Dukes’ Theatre – fig. 5 - reputedly by Sir Christopher Wren (L. Hotson, 1928) for the king’s brother, the Duke of York).

Figure 5 - Dorset Gardens Theatre.

However, recital with performance becomes ever more elaborated during the eighteenth century in the houses of continental principalities (e.g. a summer palace of Schwetzingen, Baden - Wurtemberg fig. 6, and Cesky Krumlov outside Prague).

Such that far from the

natural acoustic of the guild hall or Town House (augmented and set with temporary staging and scenes) the auditorium becomes an ever smaller part in complement to the larger and permanent mounting structures for settings - sets both natural and urbane, a proliferating construction (figure 7) enclosing the performers.

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While only at Chatsworth, in Derbyshire has an equivalent example been initiated.

During the early

Figure 6 Schwetzingen Schloss theatre.

development of this renowned country house and landscape of vistas, a music room became transformed into a house theatre. Of extant examples Figure 6 several remain none the less, within the terms of ‘hall’ , 'auditorium' or ‘music chamber’ well suited to both staged performance and recital by ensemble, often within a college campus and usually reserved for an invited audience.

Figure 7 Complex machines for setting and staging.

With a flourishing of country house building in Britain during the nineteenth century, examples and ideas were initiated in some country houses remote from a public concert chamber or performance venue.

The country house, hall or castle, purposely incorporated an auditorium for

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recitals or festivities with a household audience, perhaps either as a ‘largesse’, an included part of life seen in the round or as a celebration of renowned abilities.

It was the latter case which prompted the singer Adelina Patti and

her husband to make alterations 1980 - 90 to Craig-y-Nos Castle ( S.A. Bucknall, 1993, fig. 8) with Architects Alfred Bucknall and Edward Jennings (an FRIBA 1934) to add an auditorium for dancing designed to change for performances with mounted sets, using a tilting floor and seating

Figure 8 - the Adelina Patti theatre.

an audience of 150 people (as built with a balcony nearer 200). Earlier experience on a theatre in Swansea, informed this addition of a new wing, alongside other works in the riverside landscape.

Kelham Hall near Nottingham (fig. 9) rebuilt in 1857 by Sir George Gilbert Scott for John Manners-Sutton, includes a double height music hall , Figure 9 - Kelham Hall.

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richly decorated and stencilled as for noble ‘largesse’ and hospitality.

In an otherwise retired location at Shadwell Park near Thetford, (fig. 10) a cruciform hall is developed as a setting for music by Samuel S Teulon (Architect) in 1856 for Sir Robert Figure 10 – Shadwell Park, Norfolk.

Buxton.

Thus forming a new reception

for guests and continuing a festival tradition of The Dowager Lady Buxton.

Since the nineteenth century both public opinion and patronage have developed with a general interest in embracing performance and with a popularity of music and the performing arts in diverse areas of contemporary public life.

As a consequence the desire for private halls has dwindled further

since the nineteenth century.

Both music and its presentation with dance (or

mime action) has become an embraced aspect of public life for a wide social cross-section.

Guilds or Trades Unions, corporate bodies, key social and political figures, prefer to patronise public performance and festivals. Publicity of this kind is not seen as an embarrassment, moreover, this is becoming an expected part of participation in a process of shared cultural developments, a dynamic which is seen to inform and educate a new generation.

In this an era of

public festivals, performance is seen as fully located within the public realm. © Colin D. Brooking Dip. Arch.

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References and Bibliography

S. A. Bucknall (1993) The Life and Work of Benjamin J. Bucknall. (unpublished holding) RIBA M. Girouard (1978) Life in the English Country House, Yale University Press M. Girouard (1979) The Victorian Country House,

Yale University Press

M. Holmes (1969) Elizabethan London,

Cassell

L. Hotson (1928) The Commonwealth and Restoration Stage, Harvard University Press W.G. Keith (1914) The Burlington magazine vol.25 pp29-33, 85-98.

Burlington Magazine N. Pevsner (1998) The Buildings of England : London 1, Penguin S. Bradley E.O. Sachs (1981) Modern Opera Houses & Theatres. Vol. 3 pp.57 – 58 E.A.E. Woodrow Arno Press R. Spalding (1990) The diary of Bulstrode Whitelocke.

O.U.P.

G. Strangways (1937) The Home of the Hollands.

John Murray

R. Strong (1998) The Tudor and Stuart Monarchy, Vol.3 Jacobean and Caroline.

Woodbridge, Boydell

R. Tames (1999) Clerkenwell and Finsbury past,

Historical Publications

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