12 - William Shield’s A Collection of Favourite Songs (c.1775)

Summary

The professional life of the Tyneside-born musician William Shield (1748/49–1829) is relatively well documented from the late 1770s, when he established himself in London as a successful composer and arranger of music for more than forty stage productions, mostly at Covent Garden Theatre, where he was employed for fifteen years. Shield's ability to har-monize and orchestrate traditional ‘national airs’ was particularly admired by colleagues including Joseph Haydn. A respected orchestral and chamber musician, he was elected to the Royal Society of Musicians in 1779 and was appointed Musician in Ordinary to George III in 1787 and Master of the King's Music in 1817. On his death he was accorded a state burial in Westminster Abbey.

Contemporary published accounts of Shield's early life are largely anecdotal and sometimes contradictory, providing few verifiable answers to the key question: how did a young northern musician of relatively humble background access the necessary training and opportunities to pursue such a stellar London career? This chapter will shed light on that question through the lens of Shield's earliest publication, A Collection of Favourite Songs (c. 1775). Having considered what the music and lyrics of the songs themselves, alongside advertisements for an early performance, reveal about early influences on Shield's compositional style and the cultural context for his earliest works, the discus-sion will focus on the list of 329 supporters and admirers who subscribed in advance to the collection. The involvement of a London publisher suggests that Shield was already building professional relationships and seeking a market in the capital, yet the majority of subscribers lived in the North-East and the collection was printed in Durham, showing a degree of continuing reliance on and connection with audiences in his native region. By cross-referencing names and locations with biographical dictionaries, trade directories, parish and estate records, playbills and periodicals, it has been possible to identify just over half the subscribers and to posit a feasible trajectory for Shield's early career that establishes the context for their engagement with his music.

❧ Setting the Scene

William Shield was baptized on 5 March 1748/49 in the parish church of St Mary the Virgin, Whickham, some five miles inland of Newcastle upon Tyne.