Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-ndw9j Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-05T11:00:39.672Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Sources of popular song in early nineteenth-century Britain: problems and methods of research

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 November 2008

Anthony Bennett
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

In urbanised Britain by the nineteenth century, the long symbiosis of the oral tradition with songs transmitted at least in part through printing was turning firmly in favour of the latter. Despite this — and largely because of the welcome rediscovery of industrial folk song — our picture of popular song between 1800 and 1850 is currently dominated by music in the survival of which oral transmission has played the greater part. Even when the music we hear can be shown with any certainty to have been in circulation at that time, a major cirticism of this emphasis arises. The oral tradition is a sifting process; what survives has passed ‘the test of time’, and this can only obscure the picture.

Type
Research Article
Information
Popular Music , Volume 2 , January 1982 , pp. 69 - 89
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1982

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Adolphus, J. 1839. Memoirs of John Bannister, Comedian, 2 vols. (London)Google Scholar
Bennett, A. 1980/1981. ‘Broadsides on the trial of Queen Caroline’, Proceedings of the Royal Musical Association, 107, pp. 71–85.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fiske, R. 1974. English Theatre Music in the Eighteenth Century (London)Google Scholar
Gretton, T. 1980. Murders and Moralities: English Catchpenny Prints 1800–1860 (London)Google Scholar
Hindley, C. 1886. History of the Catnach Press (London).Google Scholar
Hindley, C. 1878. The Life and Times of James Catnach (London)Google Scholar
Holloway, J. and Black, J. 1975 and 1979. Later English Broadside Ballads (vol. 1, Lincoln, Nebr., vol. 2, London)Google Scholar
Mayhew, H. 1851. London Labour and the London Poor, 4 vols. (London)Google Scholar
Newburg, V. E. 1972. Chapbooks: a Bibliography (London)Google Scholar
Newburg, V. E. ‘Poetry of Seven Dials, The’, 1867. The Quarterly Review, 244 (04), pp. 382–406.Google Scholar
Shepard, L. 1969. John Pitts (London)Google Scholar
Todd, W. B. 1974. A Dictionary of Printers in London 1800–1840 (London)Google Scholar
Vicinus, M. (ed.) 1975. Broadsides of the Industrial North (Newcastle upon Tyne)Google Scholar
Baring-Gould, S. Broadsides, 10 vols., London, British Library, LR 271 a 2Google Scholar
Beuler, J. 1823–1833. Comic Songs to Popular Tunes, 11 vols., London, British Library, 11621 c 12Google Scholar
Beuler, J. ‘The Age of Horrors’, London, British Library, G 295 xx (1)Google Scholar
Beuler, J.Convivial Songster, The, London, British Library, 1077 K 15(19)Google Scholar
Crampton, T. Broadsides, 8 vols., London, British Library, 11621 h 11Google Scholar
Crampton, T. Broadsides, ‘Der Freischutism or ‘Tis a Hit’, London, British Library, G 295 xx(3);Google Scholar
also, without tune title, Universal Songster II, p. 145Google Scholar
Dibdin, C. 1801. Song Smith, London, British Library, 11623 aa 7Google Scholar
Dibdin, C. 1807. Mirth and Metre, London, British Library, 11603 bb 15Google Scholar
Dibdin, C. ‘The Yorkshire Concert’, printed by Clementi, Bangor, Hyde, Collard & Davis c. 1801–6, London, British Library, G 396(28)Google Scholar
Dibdin, T. 1807. ‘The Tortoiseshell Tom Cat’, published c. 1808–10 by Goulding, Phipps, D'Almaine & Co., London, British Library, H 2830 g(26)Google Scholar
Dibdin, T. ‘Drops of Brandy’, Manuscript copies, c. 1800, London, British Library, Add. MSS 25075, fo. 31 v; 29371, fo. 57 vGoogle Scholar
Dibdin, T.Everlasting Songster, London, British Library, Hirsch III 739Google Scholar
Dibdin, T.Lover's Harmony, The, Parts 18 and 19, London, British Library, 1077 g 45 (2), (2b)Google Scholar
Markordt, J. 1780. Tom Thumb, vocal score published by Preston, J., London, British Library, D 282 (7)Google Scholar
Markordt, J., Matthews' Songster/Harmonicon, London, Printing Library of the St Bride Foundation, LS 71Google Scholar
Moncrieff, W. T. 1821. Tom and Jerry or Life in London, 2nd edition published by Richardson, Thomas in Richardson's Minor Drama, vol. I (London, 1828), British Library, 643 a 14Google Scholar
Moncrieff, W. T.Naval Songster, London, British Library, 11622 bbb 22(1)Google Scholar
Moncrieff, W. T. ‘Odds and Ends’, London, British Library, 11622 bbb 22(1) No. 5Google Scholar
Moncrieff, W. T. ‘Pensioner's Complaint, The’, London, British Library, 1875 b 19, no foliation but approximately alphabetical arrangementGoogle Scholar
Moncrieff, W. T. ‘Ship on Fire’/‘The Lads of the Village’, London, British Library, 11621 K 5 fos. 208, 209Google Scholar
Moncrieff, W. T.Songster's Multum in Parvo, 6 vols., London, British Library, 11622 de 10Google Scholar
Moncrieff, W. T. ‘Steady, Port, — a little Steady’, London, British Library, 11622 bbb 22(1) No. 15Google Scholar
Moncrieff, W. T. ‘Turf, The’, London, British Library, H 1252 (21)Google Scholar
Universal Songster or Museum of Mirth, 3 vols., London, British Library, 2288 e 13Google Scholar