How could I resist this event?! After all my efforts a few years ago, researching the borrowing of legal deposit music at the University of St Andrews in the early 19th century, I simply HAVE to attend this. It’s somewhat ‘meta’ for a scholar librarian to take a research interest in the borrowing habits of readers who ‘checked out’ centuries ago, isn’t it?
I’ve rearranged my research hours accordingly, so I can finish the week on a research rather than a librarianly note:-
I accepted a generous donation of old books to the Library a couple of weeks ago. This presented me, personally, with a bit of a problem because our offices, furniture and contents are being moved around, and I had proudly emptied most of my shelves in readiness. There will be fewer shelves in the other office. And now I had two shelves full of old Scottish music – right up my street – which needed cataloguing.
Most vital priority – get them done before I retire from the Library.
Almost as vital – to get them done before the move on Thursday next week!
Of course, the lovely thing is that they’re books I’ve encountered in various research contexts … the PhD; the Bass Culture project (https://HMS.Scot); the book chapter on subscriptions; and my own forthcoming monograph.
I catalogued like crazy on Thursday and Friday. I’ve catalogued Sammelbande (personal bound volumes) of songs, piano music and fiddle tunes. I’ve shown colleagues books signed by George Thomson. I’ve indexed Gow’s strathspeys and reels. And yesterday I blogged about James Davie and his Caledonian Repository.
But I’ve also just enjoyed handling the music, because sometimes one finds some endearingly human evidence of the scores being used, even to the point of needing mending. It’s quite touching to ponder how much a piece had been used, before it actually needed stitching – here, along a line where the edge of the printer’s block had originally left a dent in the paper:-
Stitched on one side, pasted on the other!
I’ve smiled at Georgian ladies’ stitched repairs to much-loved pieces, noticed with amusement a handful of early Mozart Allan books (yes, including some strathspeys and reels) in a fin-de-siecle Sammelband which had seen better days; spotted piano fingerings pencilled in; and best of all, found a tartan ribbon in a volume dedicated to the Duke of Sussex – his personal copy, which was first sold out of the family’s possession in 1844. His library was dispersed after he died in straitened financial circumstances:-
Nine Scots Songs and three Duetts, newly arranged with a harp or piano forte accompaniment / by P. Anthony Corri
This book has the Duke’s family crest on a label pasted inside, and the outer cover is embossed with ‘A F’ (Augustus Frederick), reflecting the monogram on the title page.
The Duke of Sussex’s mongramAugustus Frederick, Duke of Sussex (1773-1843)
The tartan endpapers and tartan ribbon between pp.30-31 are a perfect illustration of what I have written about in a chapter on tartanry in my forthcoming monograph. Everyone – whether nobility or commoner – liked a bit of tartan on or inside their Scottish song books, and here, someone even found a bit of tartan ribbon to use as a bookmark.
I have just a few of those books left to catalogue now. There’s an intriguing one without a cover or title page, waiting for 9 am on Monday …! Hopefully, I’ll end up with an empty bookcase again.
To be fair, David Baptie spoke highly of the Aberdonian James Davie, an early to mid 19th Century Scottish song enthusiast. He was a friend of the Dundonian song collector James Wighton.
However, correspondence between the two men reveals him writing sour objections to other contemporaries’ activities and opinions. I quoted some of his grumblings in my first book, Our Ancient National. Airs. I formed the impression that he was decidedly irritable in his old age!
Here he is, in characteristic tone at the start of his CaledonianRepository:-
Arrangers? Pshaw!
Notwithstanding this, I was excited to accession several books of this Caledonian Repository to the library, since they’re quite rare. The books are tatty and fragile, but a tangible link with the past – they’re about 200 years old.
The Repository is in two series. We have three books from the first and two from the second. Grateful that the tune contents pages were there, I sorted out which pages belonged where, then catalogued them. Oh, my fingers flew. But the last one that I managed to catalogue before 5 pm yesterday, simply didn’t want to play fair. The catalogue entry was done. But, without going into details, it wasn’t displaying properly.
I went home, had tea, opened the laptop and recatalogued that piece using the info I’d already entered.
No luck.
I removed the identifying sequential number and tried again.
Still no luck.
Maybe ‘something’ magical would happen to it overnight? It was too much to hope! Mr Davie, irascible as ever, did NOT want that book to appear properly in our catalogue.
Finally, my line-manager suggested trying to give it a different barcode. I have absolutely no idea why the system didn’t like the one I’d assigned it, but I did as suggested, and hey presto, we have Davie’s Caledonian Repository, Series 2, Book 2, properly catalogued and accessible.
So that left me with Series 2, Book 1 to do this morning. That book has all its pages, but the page numbering is, shall we say, a little quixotic. Mr Davie has had the last laugh there.
Nonetheless, we do now have all five items in the Whittaker Library catalogue. I like to think Davie would be a little bit pleased!
Few people in Glasgow knew that I had an unfinished first PhD guiltily lurking in my past, when I announced I wanted to do a PhD. It would actually be my second attempt. I’m told that someone (an academic?) asked that memorable and somewhat hurtful question, ‘What does a librarian want with a PhD, anyway?’
Chained to the shelves – Wimborne Minster Chained Library (Wikipedia)
I realised with a jolt, yesterday morning, that I would be retiring from librarianship exactly fifteen years to the day, since I submitted my thesis to the University of Glasgow. I never managed to cease being a librarian in order to become a full-time academic, because I had family responsibilities in Glasgow, and the chances of a full career-change without relocation were limited, to say the least. However, if I entered librarianship with the unfulfilled expectation of soon having a PhD from Exeter, and the aspiration to become a scholar-librarian …. well, I did achieve the latter aspiration. After getting the Glasgow PhD, I became partially seconded to research three years later, and I’ll continue as a part-time researcher when I’m unshackled from the library shelves.
I don’t know who it was that queried whether a librarian actually needed a PhD, more than twenty years ago. It’s probably a good thing I don’t know! However, if I could show that individual how I’ve just spent my afternoon, then maybe they’d begin to understand.
The other day, an academic colleague said they were putting a student in touch with me, to advise them about resources for a project. This afternoon, I was working from home as a librarian, so I decided to spend the time finding suitable resources for my enquirer. I had in mind a lever-arch file from my own research activities, that I knew was in my study-alcove.
Subject Specialist
[Scottish] ResearchFish
The more I thought about the query, the more things I thought of suggesting. I looked at my own monograph, for a start, along with a couple of essay collections that I’ve contributed to. I compiled a list, mostly but not entirely from the library catalogue. (I tweaked a few catalogue entries whilst I was at it. What does an academic want with a library qualification?, one might ask!) I The family balefully eyed the dining-room table that they were hoping to eat off, as I moved aside the ancient and modern books that were gaily strewn across its surface. However, I’m fairly content that I’ve done my preparation to help with the query. I’ve also enjoyed an afternoon in the company of old friends – the compilers, authors and editors of all those books!
A Value-Added Librarian
Listen, I wouldn’t have known any of those resources if I hadn’t done that PhD. I wouldn’t have known what the arguments were. I wouldn’t have known how nineteenth and early twentieth century song-collectors viewed their collections, nor the metaphors they used to describe them, nor which collections might be of particular interest. I wouldn’t subsequently have collaborated on The Historical Music of Scotland database. And if I hadn’t gone on researching, I wouldn’t have known about some of the more recent materials, either.
I kennt his faither! (A Scot knows what that means)
There might have been times when others wondered who I thought I was, but I am absolutely certain that it has come in useful!
I’ve written quite a bit about women in musical history, so I’m adding something to the top of this post every couple of days during Women’s History Month – mostly flashbacks to women musicians I’ve researched, but some other discoveries too. (I’ve been shifting things around to a more chronological order, but I’ve always added the new bit first!) You’ll find more musicians than composers in this posting, just because of my own recent research.
Sometimes I look at the history of women musicians from the point of view of good library provision for our readers, whilst at other times my own research interests are foremost. It just depends on the day of the week, because I currently occupy two roles in the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. For 3.5 days a week, I’m a librarian. For 1.5, a postdoctoral researcher.
15. The Ketelbey Fellowship
It’s a whole year since I learned that I had been awarded the first Ketelbey postdoctoral research fellowship at the University of St Andrews. Scholar Doris Ketelbey was a significant figure in the history of the department. I felt highly honoured to have been the first Ketelbey Fellow from September to December 2023.
14. Representation of Women Composers in the Library
I couldn’t resist adding the open access article I published about my EDI activity in our own Whittaker Library:-
It’s a privilege to shape a library collection, so I’m pleased to have just ordered and catalogued several relevant books this month.
Susan Tomes, Women and the Piano: a History in 50 Lives (Yale University Press, 2024) Read more about it on the publisher’s website, here. In actual fact, it’s the fourth title by this author that we now have in stock. So if readers like this, they might like the earlier three, too!
Margaret C. Watson, Women in Academia : Achieving our Potential. (Market Harborough : Troubadour, 2024). Not a book about women in history, but very much for women in the present day!
Gillian Dooley, She played and sang: Jane Austen and Music (Manchester University Press, 2024). Back to history again.
Women and Music in Ireland / ed. Jennifer O’Connor-Madsen; Laura Watson & Ita Beausang (Boydell Press, 2022)
Moreover, there’s a new Routledge book coming out this summer – I have ordered it for the Whittaker Library. Of course, I may have retired from the Library by the time it arrives. This just means I won’t need to catalogue it! I’ll still be a part-time researcher, so I’ll be able to read it:-
It’s some years now, since a single-minded schoolgirl decided action was necessary. In 2015, Jessy McCabe noticed that Edexel had no women composers in the A-Level Music syllabus, and successfully petitioned to rectify this, via Change.org. I found out about her impressive initiative when I was beginning to start serious work on building up our library collection to include more music – contemporary and historical – by women and people of colour.
Jessy is now a Special Needs teacher. I’m sure she’ll go far.
11. Forgotten Women Composers
Part of academia entails sharing research outcomes beyond the ‘ivory walls’. It’s called public engagement, and that’s the opportunity I seized when my old friend The People’s Friend magazine commissioned me to write a feature back in 2020.
The sound of forgotten music: Karen McAulay uncovers some of the great female composers who have been lost from history’, in The People’s Friend, Special Edition, 11 Sep 2020, 2 p. (Dundee : D C Thomson). I blogged about it at the time (here).
10. Late Victorian Women Musicians
Since my more recent research has focused on the late Victorian era and the first part of the twentieth century, you’ll not be surprised to find that I found some interesting Scottish women musicians of that era! They are forgotten today – but I’ve done my bit to raise their profiles!
Newsletter article, ‘‘Our Heroine is Dead’: Miss Margaret Wallace Thomson, Paisley Organist (1853-1896)’, The Glasgow Diapason, March 2023, 10-15. (You can find this article in full on this blog)
‘An Extensive Musical Library’: Mrs Clarinda Webster, LRAM, Brio vol.59 no.1 (2022), 29-42 (a late Victorian head teacher who founded a music school in Aberdeen, and later did a national survey of music in public libraries – which she presented to the Library Association!)
In October 2023, I pondered about Mr *and Mrs* J. Spencer Curwen (amongst others) in another blog post, when I remarked upon early twentieth century attitudes to folk song.
9. In Praise of Music Cataloguers! Introducing Miss Elizabeth Lambert
Before I started the Claimed From Stationers’ Hall music copyright network, I had spent some months researching the wonderful late 18th and early 19th century music copyright collection at the University of St Andrews. A key resource was the handwritten catalogue in two notebooks, largely compiled by Miss Elizabeth Lambert (later to become Mrs Williams, when she married and moved to London.)
I just love the fact that this earnest young woman (I’m going out on a limb here, but I’m pretty sure she must have been earnest!) created a useful resource which would help everyone get maximum use out of the music repertoire that other libraries were less than impressed by. So we had Elizabeth cataloguing the collection, and numerous men and women, friends of the professors, making use of it. I blogged about her, and eventually wrote an article for the Edinburgh Bibliographical Society, mentioning her again.
‘A Music Library for St Andrews: use of the University’s Copyright Music Collections, 1801-1849’, in Journal of the Edinburgh Bibliographical Society no.15 (2020), 13-33.
The library’s copyright collection of music was a boon for middling class women like headmistress Mrs Bertram, her teacher daughters and their pupils. It does lead one to wonder if they had a harp at the school. I checked their borrowing records for more evidence. They certainly borrowed several volumes which included harp music.
7. Students but not at University? Educating Young Women
It’s time to turn to piano teacher Mr T. Latour. I’d like to refer you to my June 2018 blog post about women in St Andrews using pedagogical musical material in the early 19th century. Possibly the self-same young ladies attending, or having attended Mrs Bertram’s school?! The illustration features a young woman – probably just approaching or about marriagable age – at an upright piano. The abundant floral arrangement atop the piano (quite apart from sending shivers down the housekeeper’s spine every time the young pianist played too enthusiastically) suggests a well-to-do household. Following Latour’s instructions, the pianist has elegantly flat hands …..
T. Latour – Ladies’ Thorough Bass
Latour advises on the seating position, and how to hold ones hands elegantly
6. Not my work – but very timely for WHM 2024]
I’m not posting anything relating to my work today, but I saw mention of a great new article by Dominic Bridge the other day, so I thought I’d share details here. It’s a fascinating read. The Journal for Eighteenth-Century Studies is part of the Wiley Online Library:-
Back in 2018 when I was awarded the AHRC networking grant for the Claimed from Stationers Hall network, I drew up a list of women composers from the Georgian era. There were more than one might have expected – perhaps they only composed a handful of pieces, in many cases, but nonetheless – they composed. You can find the list on a separate page on this blog, here. And you can read more about it in the blogpost I wrote in July 2018,
This lady ran a girls’ school at St Leonard’s in St Andrews. This was NOT the famous and long-established private school that has long stood there, but an earlier enterprise. And Mrs Bertram and her daughters subsequently moved to Edinburgh, to the disappointment of parents of daughters in St Andrews!
The photo portrays a Mrs Bertram of Edinburgh. Chronologically, she could well be ‘our’ Mrs Bertram, and a scholarly bent is suggested by the pile of books at her hand.
2. The Accomplished Ladies of Torloisk
I almost forgot about the musical Maclean-Clephane ladies of Torloisk, which is a stately home on the island of Mull. But how could I forget about them, considering I published a lengthy article about them some years ago?! Luckily, a book of letters by Sir Walter Scott crossed my library desk, and even though it didn’t contain those particular letters, this did remind me of his musical friends in Torloisk!
Karen E. McAulay, ‘The Accomplished Ladies of Torloisk‘, International Review of the Aesthetics and Sociology of Music, Vol. 44, No. 1 (June 2013), 57-78
Today, I’d like to introduce a woman composer who predates most of the individuals I’ve encountered. Professor James Porter applies his considerable intellect to produce this in-depth article:-
‘An English Composer and Her Opera: Harriet Wainewright’s Comàla (1792)’, Journal of Musicological Research Feb, 2021. Published online: 16 Feb 2021.
I’ve started listening to another Audible book, but it’ll take a while for me to finish it. To take a break from listening, I sidled over to the piano and played a one-eyed rendition of my favourite song.
Lady Anne Bothwell’s Lament (Baloo, my Boy)
My Song Gems (Scots), edited by James Wood and Learmont Drysdale (London: Vincent Music Co., 1908), is a nice big score that sits comfortably on the piano stand. This song is arranged by Finlay Dun, a Victorian arranger. As I squinted at the words, they didn’t look like what I remembered hearing sung from Cedric Thorpe Davie and George McVicar’s The Oxford Scottish Song Book (1969). What was going on? I suspected Davie and McVicar had taken their words from George Farquhar Graham and James Wood’s mid-Victorian Songs of Scotland. ‘You’ll see’, I told my bemused son. ‘The words will have been too smutty for Victorian ears, so Graham and Wood changed them.’
Davie used their words – which were perfectly acceptable for a collection intended both for classroom and adult use – but his musical setting is updated.
A Deserted Mother and Child
Graham and Wood’s collection revealed in the footnotes that it was an old ballad collected by Bishop Percy. However, Graham said that …
The Old Ballad, though poetically meritorious, is so coarse in most of its stanzas as to be repugnant to modern feelings of propriety. We have, therefore, adopted only the first stanza of it, the additional stanzas here given having been written by a friend of the Publisher.
Songs of Scotland (Edinburgh: Wood & Co., 1850), Vol.2, pp.30-31
Percy’s original version is in the National Library of Scotland’s Digital Gallery (Reliques of Ancient Poetry, 1767). Today, the lyrics are inoffensive!
And here’s the Cedric Thorpe Davie setting using Graham and Wood’s sanitized words:-
Kathleen McKellar Ferguson sings the Oxford Scottish Song Book version, divinely, here on YouTube
The Song Gems (Scots) version is in modern English and the text has been partially rewritten again – it falls halfway between the original and the sanitized words! And the musical arrangement? Straight from Graham and Wood’s collection.
Percy, verse 3: Smile not as thy father did, to cozen maids, nay God forbid / Bot yett I feire, thou wilt gae neire Thy fatheris hart, and face to beire.
Wood and Drysdale, verse 2: Smile not as thy father did, to cozen maids, may God forbid / For in thine eye his look I see, The tempting look that ruin’d me …
Olde English or modern, take your pick!
As for Graham and Wood, or Thorpe and McVicar? Not a ruinous smile to be be seen! The lady may have been deserted, but no hint that she had first been seduced!
Karen McAulay, Musicologist 