This engaging and immensely readable book is the first history of British music to be published for fifty years. It tells the fascinating story of the people who have shaped Britain's musical life over the centuries: the composers and performers; the promoters and impresarios; the conductors and critics. It shows how its music evolved – and is still evolving – against a background of religious, social, political, technical and technological change. It addresses readers with all levels of musical knowledge and interest, from the musically-minded and musically-informed to those seeking an accessible intro­duction to the subject.

Volume One covers the period up to 1800, beginning with the discovery of a set of pipes dating from 2000 BC in an Irish bog and following the twists and turns of music in the British Isles up to the end of the eighteenth century. Celts and Romans, Saxons and Normans all brought music with them. Kings and queens, popes and archbishops alike saw music as a means of glorifying themselves and pursuing their religious and secular ends. The Reformation threw church music into chaos, but none the less managed to produce some of the greatest British composers. The Civil Wars and the Commonwealth created even greater disruption. The Restoration led to a new flowering of musical ideas. The eighteenth century saw the emergence of a musical market place. Continental musicians flocked to Britain for the money they could earn there. Concert promo­ters and theatre managers competed to attract new talent and reap the rewards.

Acknowledgements

Preface

1 Very Early Music

2 Romans, Druids, and Bards

3 Anglo-Saxons, Celts, and Harps

4 Augustine, Plainsong, and Vikings

5 Organum, Notation, and Organs

6 Normans, Cathedrals, and Giraldus Cambrensis

7 The Chapel Royal, Medieval Lyrics, and the Waits

8 Minstrels, Troubadours, and Courtly Love

9 The Morris, and the Ballad

10 Music, Science, and Politics

11 Dunstable, and la Contenance Angloise

12 The Eton Choirbook, and the Early Tudors

13 Pre-Reformation Ireland, Wales, and Scotland

14 Robert Carver, and the Scottish Reformation

15 The English Reformation, Merbecke, and Tye

16 John Taverner

17 John Sheppard

18 Thomas Tallis

19 Early Byrd

20 Catholic Byrd

21 Madrigals

22 The Waits, and the Theatre

23 Folk Music, Ravenscroft, and Ballads

24 The English Ayre, and Thomas Campion

25 John Dowland

26 King James, King Charles, and the Masque

27 Orlando Gibbons

28 Thomas Tomkins, and Church Music

29 King James, King Charles, and Archbishop Laud

30 Civil War, Playford, and the Beginnings of Opera

31 The Return of the King

32 The Violin, and Matthew Locke

33 Humfrey, Wise, Blow, and Turner

34 Purcell, and King James II

35 William of Orange, Purcell, and the First Concerts

36 Purcell, the Theatre, and Dido and Aeneas

37 After Purcell

38 Scotland and Ireland in the Early Eighteenth Century

39 The Arrival of Handel

40 Handel, the Royal Academy of Music, and Ballad Opera

41 Handel and the Oratorio

42 The Pleasure Gardens, and the Folk Tradition

43 Greene, Boyce, and Avison

44 Thomas Arne

45 Continental Music, and Carl Abel

46 The London Bach, and Frederick Herschel

47 The Cult of Handel

48 John Wesley, and West Gallery Music

49 Hook, Dibdin, Shield, and the Historical Perspective

50 A Reverence for Foreigners, and Haydn

51 The Glee

52 The Vienna Four

53 Commercial Pressures, Crotch, and Samuel Wesley

Notes

Printed Sources

Internet Sources

Index