Dr Karen McAulay explores the history of Scottish music collecting, publishing and national identity from the 18th to 20th centuries. Research Fellow at Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, author of two Routledge monographs.
I’ve recently highlighted a new published article focusing on the business history of Kerr’s music shop and publishing business. Kerr died near the end of the nineteenth century, and his wife Mary died in the early twentieth. These early trading years are the focus of the article’s authors:-
As I’ve mentioned, there is a mass of very useful and informative detail about business history, and piano sales in Scotland in this era.
Corrections
However, I’m perturbed by the final paragraph of section 4, the Case Study, which precedes the next section 5, Discussion. Is there’s a protocol for raising such concerns? I really don’t know, but I don’t think it can be inappropriate politely to express them here. It is regrettable if misinformation creeps into the story of this significant Glasgow firm.
The Shop in Berkeley Street
The paragraph begins,
The legacy of the James S Kerr business was both the music shop which continued to operate until the 1970s, and perhaps, more lastingly, music publishing which continued into the 21st century.
No mention is made of the purchase of the firm by a group of entrepreneurs including singer Robert Wilson, in the mid-20th century.
A Berkeley Street shop continued later than the 1970s, as the Glasgow Music Centre. The article contradicts its own statement above, when it references a 1980 news item in the Aberdeen Press & Journal (7 August 1980). (Kudos to the Aberdeen paper for quoting a woman, Ruby Anderson, who was co-director. Hers is a new name to me!). However, the St Andrews Citizen (9 August 1980) is more informative:-
The new premises will house Mozart Allan, Bayley & Ferguson Ltd, Glasgow Music Centre, James S Kerr and Thistle Records, all under the direction of Gavin D Farquhar. The new set-up […] will operate from 65 Berkley [sic] Street.
Addresses: 79 and 65 Berkeley Street
The subsequent information a couple of sentences on, is technically correct – 79 Berkeley Street is still the registered address, as we can see from the Gov.uk company information. And the shop certainly was at no.79 in the 1930s. This is all accurate.
The current company also has its address at 79 Berkeley Street, the same address as the music shop of the mid-1930s and it is still possible to buy copies …
However, this is also just a little misleading, as I can demonstrate, because there were actually two Berkeley Street addresses:-
79 Berkeley Street was the address purchased by the individual who acquired the firm after the Kerr family. To this day it remains the registered address. It did appear at the foot of early publications after Kerr’s had moved from 314 Paisley Road. However, the shop was operating from 65 Berkeley Street, certainly by 1980. See the image at the top of this post.
The shop operated into the 21st century, not the 1970s, although latterly the retail side had no connection with Kerr’s Corporation.
I did visit the shop in the 1990s, long before I started my research. And to this day, a small Thistle Records sign is still there, a ghostly legacy from the past (just above the railing):-
Publishing History
Their music publishing did not really continue into the 21st century. It dwindled away within a few years of Wilson’s untimely death. Whilst copies of Merry Melodies can indeed be purchased, they’re merely reprints. There has been no publishing of new music for many decades. (Any questions of still copyright works are another matter entirely. There has been no new music.)
Sheet Music Plus has a couple of reprinted titles in stock, one being Kerr’s Second Collection of Merry Melodies. The cover art is unchanged, apart from the new sans serif font of ‘Kerr’s Second’ at the head of the cover, and sans serif again for ‘James S. Kerr, 65 Berkeley Street Glasgow C.3’ at the foot. (The Third Collection reprint uses a different font for the same address.) But note that although the postcode actually changed from ‘C.3’ to G3 7DX in the late 1960s, it still appears on the reprints.
Evidence for my Assertions
What’s my evidence for my assertions? Quite apart from a lot of research, I’m very proud to know the last owner of the music shop; have spoken at length with a member of Wilson’s family, and I’ve also corresponded with the last surviving board member of Kerr’s Corporation:-
‘In terms of publishing it is a zombie company in that no additions to the catalogue have been made for many years.’
I’ve written quite a lot about the later history of the firm, in three publications: my monograph; my History Scotland article, and the RMA Research Chronicle article about the Scottish women musicians.
A Social History of Amateur Music-Making and Scottish National Identity: Scotland’s Printed Music, 1880-1951 (Routledge, 2025)
‘The ‘Scottish Soprano’ and the ‘Voice of Scotland’: the Importance of Nationality to Flora Woodman and Robert Wilson’, History Scotland Vol.25 no.1 (Spring 2025), 74-81 (accessible online via public library e-magazine apps, or you may be able to order a paper copy online.)
Whilst I’m whimsical enough to rather like the idea of a birthday cake for a book, I don’t think I’ll go quite that far. Still …
I’m celebrating the second birthday of my second book – A Social History of Amateur Music Making and Scottish National Identity. It was reviewed by Soundyngs in January 2025 – https://soundyngs.wp.st-andrews.ac.uk/…/review-a…/ (Happily, the paperback and Kindle versions are affordable!)
Since then? Well, I have a couple of research strands on the go at present:-
1. Leng Medal Memories in Dundee, my research sponsored by an Athenaeum Award from the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. This is really coming together now – I’m working on an article and planning an event.
2. Then there’s the research into a forgotten woman Glasgow composer. I wrote an article in which she was one of the main characters, published a few months ago:- https://www.cambridge.org/…/85AB3A5B58392CEE7FCE07E7009… I have an idea for an event there, too. But I’d better get the first event tied up before I plan the second!
The later history of Kerr’s firm, after it became Kerr’s Corporation, is mentioned in my book, but also in my 2025 History Scotland article:-
‘The ‘Scottish Soprano’ and the ‘Voice of Scotland’: the Importance of Nationality to Flora Woodman and Robert Wilson’, History Scotland Vol.25 no.1 (Spring 2025), 74-81 (accessible online via public library e-magazine apps, or you may be able to order a paper copy online.)
Management & Organizational History
But I have just discovered that there’s now a new article about Kerr’s business, from an organisational, management perspective, in a Routledge journal which hasn’t crossed my radar up until now. This time, it emanates from the School of Business, University of Dundee, United Kingdom:-
It’s a different kind of article to my own writings, naturally, because the authors’ focus is on Victorian business and piano sales, whilst mine is more about music publishing and individual editors. There’s a wealth of background information about the trade side of piano-selling, which I heartily recommend – that’s not my focus at all.
The basic factual outline of Kerr’s dates and addresses probably do draw on the same sources.
But if you want to know more about the later life of the ‘Kerr’s’ brand, then I have to say my work will offer you more detail; similarly with the Logan firm. Kerr’s are not still publishing; the last surviving very elderly board member advised me that it is now essentially a ‘zombie firm’. Merry Melodies can certainly still be purchased as reprints, but not from Kerr’s, whose business documents are now ‘in a box in a cupboard’. The premises are no longer a music shop – and the last person who did own the retail business was unconnected with Kerr’s. Again, I know them.
And, let’s be accurate, Baptie’s Musical Scotland (1894) is correctly cited in the references, but incorrectly cited in the text as ‘Scottish Musicians’ (1894), but the page numbers cited are those in Musical Scotland. I’m not aware of a second book with the same date but a different title.
It’s great that Kerr is finally, decisively on the map. (Well … a gap on the map … see my 2023 blog post showing where the first shop was!)
WordPress reminded me today about a blog post that I originally wrote three years ago for WhittakerLive, the Whittaker Library blog.
I shared it again in 2024, and because I am an admirer of Francis George Scott’s work arranging Scottish songs, I thought it would be worth airing again today.
Biddy, the Maid of All Work is the title of a children’s book, dating from as early as 1871 in its original version. My own copy is an attractive bound compilation of three stories in a gift book from the turn of the century – it was given to its original owner as a Sunday School prize, and I bought it when I was researching Bayley & Ferguson’s ‘service of song’ books for magic lantern shows. As I have shared before, it’s a very moralistic Christian tale. (I’ll show you the opening paragraphs later on in this post.)
Women and Domestic Labour
But why have I gone back to services of song? As a matter of fact, that wasn’t why I thought of Biddy. Yesterday, I was thinking about women and domestic labour, and pondering over not only what had changed, but also what seems to have stayed the same. When I was working full-time, we employed a cleaner for two hours a week – we’d done so for three decades, and it certainly lessened the load. We don’t now – partly because the agency was struggling to find cleaners, and partly because I don’t feel it’s justified. But somehow, although we used to share the cleaning bill, I alone have ended up with everything connected with running the house, from mending to muffins, and dusting to drain-unblocking. (I’m told I don’t actually ‘do’ the washing, because the modern home has white goods that do everything for me. All I can say is that the washer-dryer hasn’t yet learned how to gather up the laundry, sort it, hang it, iron it and put everything away again.)
Little chimney with no pot: relic from the wash-boiler days
Our house is contemporary with the lives of ‘my’ musical Scotswomen. It was built in 1904. It was occupied by the proprietor (a shipbuilding clerk), his wife and three daughters. It still has a wee chimney leading from where the scullery boiler would have been, on the ground floor. It’s now our kitchen – but it would have been the wash-house: a place of really hard work. We still have a ‘pulley’ in what would have then have been the kitchen, and my office is what would have been the bed recess, under the stairs. Was there a servant sleeping in it? Well, there wasn’t, in the 1911 census. The range was where our dresser is. The kitchen sink? There’s now another bookcase. But the meal-preparation continues, in what was the wash-house. (A Cordon-Bleu cook would find it nightmarishly cramped!)
Anyway, I’m suitably grateful that there’s less ironing, with a much nicer iron than the first occupants would have had! I visualise scrubbed and starched cotton shirts and white frilled pinafores hanging from the pulley, where tee-shirts and jeans are now casually draped, and I do appreciate the advances in both textiles and technology!
The life of a servant like Biddy was certainly a hard one. The author asks us to have sympathy for her, not only for the hard work, but also for her feelings of being uncared-about. Now then, bear in mind that it’s a piece of fiction for children. It’s impossible to know how accurate the picture conveyed actually is. There must have been good and caring employers, and ‘Biddy’s’ employer isn’t portrayed as bad. But it was a different age. The history of domestic labour is not my area of research expertise!
Much more could be said about domestic labour, particularly about the present occupants’ expectations and recollections of childhood and early adulthood which, I can assure you, were quite a long time ago. A different era, made more complicated by the fact that there are also two sets of memories, since our childhoods weren’t simultaneous! And I’ve heard it said that as we age, our most vivid memories are of our early adulthood, when everything was new and exciting. This book (on eBay) is from the ‘sixties: my childhood, not early adulthood. But it is, sadly, from an era when the ‘young wife’ did everything domestically-related. I feel as though I’m dragged back through a time-warp into those dizzy days six decades ago.
The Time of Vivid Memories? (The Young Wife’s Cookery Book, ed. E. Maxwell-Arnot (1967)
Rose and Iden’s Live-in Servant
Anyway, my mind again turned to Rose Smith, the late Victorian/Edwardian church organist who didn’t let three children curtail her musical activities. How much help did she have around the house? So, let’s recap. Rose was born in 1870 in Lanark, and brought up by her widowed mother, mainly in Glasgow. They didn’t have a servant in the 1891 census – indeed, her mother had two lodgers as well as Rose and her older sister to look after.
Rose married in 1898. I knew that Iden and Rose Rigden’s first son was born in June 1899, so at the time of the 1901 census, there were Iden, a tax official; Rose, a teacher and church organist working from home on her ‘own account’ (ie, she was self-employed) and Iden junior, aged nearly two. Iden’s wee brother wouldn’t come along until August 1903. Although it was a small household, there was also a live-in servant, the 17-year old Bella Johnston[e], who was born in Port Logan in Wigtonshire around 1884.
I don’t know exactly how long Johnston stayed with the Rigdens. They had their second son in 1903 and a daughter in 1907, and had moved house by 1911 – where there was no live-in servant. Of course, we don’t know if Rose perhaps had a daily, non-resident maid to help her. We do tend to assume that domestic service became a less common occupation after the Great War, yet here we find the Rigdens without a resident maid, three years before the War. Selina Todd, author of an excellent article on domestic service in the first half of the century, would be unsurprised by this, however, as she demonstrates how, although practices changed, domestic service did continue. Just in a different form:-
The ‘disappearance’ of service — already heralded in the 1920s, when press coverage of ‘the servant problem’ was filled with nostalgic laments for the faithful Victorian maid — never happened. Change, of course, did occur — the live-in housemaid of the 1900s was replaced with the part-time cleaner of the 1950s […]
(Todd, see reference below)
Meanwhile, Bella Johnston herself was still a live-in domestic servant in 1911, working back in Wigtonshire in Kirkmaiden (where her grandmother had lived), for the Cook family in Weston House, Church Street. She married a Kirkmaiden fisherman in 1915.
By 1921, the Rigdons had moved up in the world – from a flat, to a house – but there was still no maid in the census.
It set me wondering. What about the other women musicians whom I’ve researched? In all honesty, I don’t think the Census data is enough on which to base any conclusions, simply because we don’t know about the domestic servants who didn’t live in – often called, ‘charladies’. The term sounds derogatory now, but may not have been considered so at the time. If anything can be deduced from a rainy Friday morning’s searching, it is that having a resident servant seems, in the early 20th century, to have depended on the level of affluence and/or evident need for help.
One thing is certain: the newspapers were full of adverts for Situations Vacant, and from job-seekers.
British Newspaper Archive
Clarinda Augusta Webster (1844-1920), was a music educationalist, and school proprietor in Aberdeen before she moved down to London. No census entry has been traced for 1901. In 1911 in Streatham, Webster employed 31-year old general servant Julia Fullick, who must have been either married or widowed at the time, because her name was the same in 1921, and she was then described as a widow, living with her sister and brother-in-law. Fullick’s occupation was now, ‘charwoman’. Webster had died in 1920; I don’t know if Fullick worked for Webster right up to when she died.
Mary Kerr (ca.1848-1908), was the wife of Glasgow music publisher James S. Kerr, and inheritor of the publishing firm. The couple had a servant whilst their family were young. Widowed and living in Saltcoats in 1901, Mary still had a ‘general servant domestic’, 21-year old Sarah Reid. By this time she had two adult children, two teenagers and a mother of 82 living with her, so I imagine Kerr and Reid would both have been kept busy! Kerr and her mother later moved back to Glasgow with at least one of the adult children – but I don’t know how much paid help they had latterly. (Mary’s mother actually outlived her by three months, living to the grand old age of 90.)
Euphemia Allan (1861-1948) was the sister of Glasgow music publisher Mozart Allan; she was a music teacher and also involved in the family firm. There’s no record of a resident servant either in Mozart Allan’s home in 1901 or 1911, or when Euphemia and her nephew (also Mozart Allan) lived there in 1921. I wonder whether Euphemia and her nephew had a charwoman – surely they must have done?!
Kate Logan (1862-1936) grew up in Inverness, where her parents had a servant and three lodgers by 1881, when Kate was the last of their offspring still at home, working as a music teacher. By 1901, her husband David was working as a music seller and employer, whilst Kate was certainly working as a pianist, although there’s no job designated against her name in the census. There was no live-in servant at that point, but after her husband’s family firm went bankrupt, Kate opened her Pianoforte and Music Saloon in 1904. Thus, by 1911 they were both designated as music sellers – and were employing 17-year old Daisy Shaw as their live-in servant. However, by 1921, the census listed no servant.
Flora Woodman (1896-1981) was a famous coloratura soprano, born in London to a mother with ‘private means’. Her mother grew up in Glasgow; in 1891 there had been two servants to look after a widow and three adult children. It comes as no surprise to learn that Flora’s own single mother had a servant, 18-year old Annie F. Butler, in the 1901 census; 22-year old Emily Owen in the 1911 census; and 34-year old Louie Hurst in 1921.
As a musicologist, I haven’t had to think about domestic service in the context of social history, but as a working mother myself, obviously I can draw on my own lived experience of running a household. I’m still left feeling distinctly impressed with Rose Smith Rigden, who performed the same juggling act of balancing a career with raising a family, when the physical work was unarguably harder. Meanwhile, I also take pleasure in the fact that I’ve memorialised the names of a number of female servants who have probably never before been mentioned in print!
NAME
BIOGRAPHY
Bella [Isabella] Johnstone [Johnston].
Born ca.1884, Wigtonshire. Worked for the Rigdens aged 17 in 1901. Aged 27, a live-in servant in Kirkmaiden in 1911. Married a fisherman in Kirkmaiden, Wigtonshire, in 1915.
Julia Mullins.
Born ca.1880. Aged 21, a servant in Bexley in 1901. Aged 31, now Julia Fullick working for Clarinda Webster, in 1911. A widowed charlady living with her sister and brother-in-law in 1921.
Sarah Reid.
Born ca.1880. Aged 21 in 1901, working for Mary Kerr.
Daisy [Margaret?] Shaw.
Born ca.1894. Aged 17 in 1911, working for the Logans.
Annie F. Butler.
Born ca.1883. Aged 18 in 1901, working for Jane [Janie] Sillars.
Emily Owen.
Born ca. 1889. Aged 22 in 1911, working for the Woodmans
Louie Hurst.
Born ca. 1887. Aged 34 in 1921, working for the Woodmans.
If you’re interested in the broader subject, Selina Todd’s article, is informative:- ‘Domestic Service and Class Relations in Britain 1900–1950’, in Past & Present, Volume 203, Issue 1, May 2009, Pages 181–204, https://doi.org/10.1093/pastj/gtp014.
Biddy, Tibby and French Bessie, by S. C. P. (Edinburgh and London: Oliphant, Anderson & Ferrier). I initially thought this was published in 1900, but I think it was mentioned in the press in 1897 – whether or not it was an identical edition. It also seems to have appeared as three individual titles in 1871. The anonymous S. C. P. also wrote other titles in the publisher’s ‘Sixpenny Books for Young People’ series.
Here’s a taster of Biddy:- the opening of Chapter 1.
Biddy worked hard, and got few thanks for it, – poor Biddy! She was maid-of-all work in a large family; and it was, “Biddy, do this,” and “Biddy, do that,” from the time she got up in the morning, till she tumbled into her hard bed at night. She had come to Glasgow from Ireland a warm-hearted, impulsive girl; but had been gradually going through a hardening process, till she was practically saying in her heart, “I care for nobody, for nobody cares for me.” Mrs Pettigrew, her present mistress, was just and faithful in all her dealings with her, and valued Biddy highly as an active, honest, efficient servant; but she was “only a servant” to her, and any other girl who worked as well could have supplied her place; and she never dreamt of the large fund of love lying unkindled at the bottom of that servant’s heart, which a little kindness and sympathy on her part would have touched like a spark amongst gunpowder, and brought forth blazing into loving action.
Mistresses lose much who have no sympathy with their servants. How many hearts are saddened and steeled for want of it, even as Biddy’s was!
I’m looking forward to my trip to London for this conference this week, and I’m grateful both for the invitation to give a paper, and for the support from my home institution, in the form of a Royal Conservatoire of Scotland Athenaeum Award. I thought it would be worthwhile sharing the link to the event again, now that the programme has been finalised.
A more comprehensive programme, including all presenter abstracts and biographies, is accessible as an Exposition on the Research Catalogue platform.
My paper is on the final afternoon, Friday 4th September:-
‘The Trumpet Major’s ‘Poetess’ Widow; the Scottish Shipping Magnate’s Daughter and the Retired Barrister: The Importance of Parental Support to Musically Gifted Girls in the Late Victorian and Edwardian Eras’.
ABSTRACT
Although I’ve encountered few women’s names in nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Scottish music publishing, I recently published an article about the five women that I did find. (Two were English by descent, but they all grew up in Scotland.) Meanwhile, in other unrelated research, I encountered a London-born Scotswoman with a completely different background, who made her career as a high-flying soprano recitalist. The common thread was their family background and/or support. In today’s paper, I’d like to focus on Rose Buchanan Smith (1870–1942), one of the Scottish-born Englishwomen, and Flora Woodman (1896–1981), the London-born Scot. The cut-off date of this conference, 1914, is significant for both women: it’s the latest possible date for Kerr’s fourth book of Kerr’s Merry Melodies, in which I first encountered Rose’s name; and the year of Flora’s concert debut in London’s Bechstein Hall.
One cannot generalise about women’s musical careers on the strength of two women’s stories. Nonetheless, when there are comparatively few stories substantial enough to draw any inferences from, those that do survive must perforce carry more weight. In my research, I have realised that it is sometimes surprisingly useful to attempt comparisons between individuals whose lives were entirely unconnected. How did these women curate their careers? What influence might their parents have had? Might their mothers have had a particular influence or been especially supportive? What about marital status? Did being a Scottish-born Englishwoman, or a London-born Scotswoman, have any particular effect on their careers? Did they make use of professional networks? And was the advent of new technologies reflected in their musical activities? I shall outline the resources to which I had access, in tracing their path from adolescence to late middle-age, and demonstrate the importance of families to a young Victorian or Edwardian woman establishing a musical career.
This project has been supported by the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland’s Athenaeum Awards.
Yes, I’m on holiday! So I’ll keep this brief, but I have to share this: the postie has just delivered my author’s copy of Print and Tourism: Travel-Related Publications from the Sixteenth to the Twentieth Century / ed. Catherine Armstrong and Elaine Jackson.
My contribution is Chapter 8, The Glories of Scotland in Picture and Song: Jumping on the Festival of Britain Bandwagon (pp.187 – 205). It enabled me to write more about this Mozart Allan publication than I was able to justify in last year’s monograph about Scottish music publishers. I’m very happy indeed to have this chapter in Vol.7 of the Printing History and Culture series.
Whilst I had intended to conduct perhaps 50 interviews in connection with my Leng Medal Memories research, I haven’t amassed quite that many – but the interviews have generally been nearer to 30 minutes than the 15 minutes that I innocently projected, so I’ve probably got easily as many recorded minutes as I initially aimed for!
As I mentioned last week, I’ve been editing my interview transcriptions, and correcting any auto-correct infelicities. (Teams and TurboScribe both struggle a little with Scottish place-names and song titles.) One of my interviewees sang, ‘O Gin I were Whar’ Gadie Rins’ in the late 1960s. I knew the name of the song, but I couldn’t put a tune to it, so I Googled it. (As you do!) Spellings vary – as you’ll see.
Well, I found Kenneth McKellar singing it with a small classical chamber ensemble. (Lovely bassoon part, I must say.) The YouTube version was a 1995 Lismore remastered recording. I haven’t tried to establish the original date, though I believe it was recorded for the BBC in the late 1950s or early 1960s. But this setting was so delicate and precise that it was hard to imagine a youngster of eleven or twelve singing it quite like this. Quite apart from the fact that the Leng Medal competition has always been unaccompanied!
My next dip into YouTube found tutor Irene Ross talking about it and then singing it, with a ukelele, for Feis Rois followers. This is livelier and more authentic, but perhaps just a wee bit more ‘folky’ than might have been performed at a music competition by children of my own generation. But I could be wrong!
However, if the folk sound is what you’re looking for, then that interpretation is itself quite sedate compared to an invigorating 1999 recording by the Old Blind Dogs! Actually, I love this – one of my great frustrations in life is that I’ve been so embedded in the more classical side of music-making that I can only enjoy listening to this and would have huge difficulty trying to sing or play in anything like this idiom. I’d love to – but I can’t!
Oh well, I have to get back to these transcriptions, so I’ll stop here for now. Energised, you might say!
Image: Stanley Howe / Upstream Gadie Burn, from Wikimedia.
My Leng Medal Memories research is funded by an Athenaeum Award from the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.
An exciting email from the Print Networks Council popped into my inbox this week, announcing a new publication. It contains a chapter that evolved from a paper I submitted back in the pandemic. Yes, I mentioned Mozart Allan’s Glories of Scotland in my book, ASocial History of Amateur Music-Making and National Identity, but I have treated it more extensively in this new chapter. It’s not every day that a musicologist gets to think about the Festival of Britain, book exhibitions, and post-war tourism. I thoroughly enjoyed both the researching and the writing of it – and I’m really looking forward to seeing an actual copy!
The latest volume in the Print Networks series has now been published; copies may be ordered via this link: https://www.peterlang.com/series/phc – where previous volumes in the series are also available.
It’s a stroke of good luck that my recent research just fits into the scope of this conference, which is taking place at the Royal Academy of Music in London from 2-4 September this year. I’d agreed with my line-manager that I should attend, but I confess I needed a little nudge to actually complete my registration, since my head has been whirling with oral history interviews and the trip down south last weekend.
I’m going to give a paper at the conference, comparing the careers of two of my musical ‘heroines’. One featured in my recent RMA Chronicle article on ladies connected with the Scottish music publishing trade; the other has been mentioned by me elsewhere, but moved in completely different circles, in a different stratum of society. Anyway, the conference cut-off date of 1914 enables me to bring them together in my paper, so I’m looking forward to this opportunity to think about them again as I settle down to write it!
