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.
Since beginning this research into Dundee’s Leng Medal competitions, I’ve posted updates from time to time. Seven of them, to be precise! If you’d like to read more, I’ve put all the links on a special page dedicated to this project:-
I shouldn’t be sharing this yet, because I’m sure I haven’t got to the end of this thread. However, it’s too exciting a piece of trivia not to share.
I saw a pen-and-ink drawing of a local church interior, on eBay. Dated 1937, it’s a bit later than the era of that church that interests me. Nonetheless, I thought it would be a nice thing to have.
Last night, I looked up the name of the artist. And it turns out that what I actually have, is a framed drawing done by the rector of the church, made the same year that he took up his charge. Even if I don’t manage to establish any connection with the musical story that I’m working on, I’m delighted to have this piece of artwork just to look at.
So, watch this space. After my forthcoming trip to the archives, maybe I’ll manage to make a connection with the drawing. If I do, my excitement will be off the register. And if not – well, it was still a pleasing acquisition.
Image by congerdesign from Pixabay
I’ve heard from many kind people who remember their involvement with the Leng Medal song competitions in Dundee, and now I’m starting to organise myself to speak to (or chat online, or email) everyone who has been in touch and expressed a willingness to share their memories with me. If you’re one of those people, and you’ve expressed a preference to share your memories via one form of communication or another, I have noted this for future reference. You’ll be hearing from me soon! But if this blog post is the first you’ve heard of my research project, then you can find out more about it here, and you can get in touch with me here. It’s not too late!)
I hoped to hear from a lot of folk, and I certainly did! So I’m contacting a few people at a time, to make it easier to organise my time. If I can, I plan to focus on a decade or so at a time – though this idea may end up being rather loosely interpreted!
I’ve just started emailing people who indicated that they could chat online, inviting them to select a day and time. I’ve allocated half an hour, so that we don’t feel rushed. But if anyone fears their memories won’t take that long to share – there’s no need to worry – any anecdotes, however wee, will help fill out the story!
I very carefully set up my Microsoft Bookings page, and so far as I could tell, I did everything correctly. However, when I shared the link, I suspect I ticked a box that should not have been ticked. Anyway, I’ve unticked the box and shared the link again. I only confess this in case anyone received an email from me but couldn’t make the link work! I’ve re-sent the email and hopefully all is now well. Every day’s a school day, as they say.
‘Two notes’
One person has revealed that they sang two notes before the teacher told them to sit back down!
I think I may have mentioned before – I work part-time, so progress will be slow but steady! I’m very much looking forward to hearing more about this remarkably long-lived and successful competition!
Karen McAulay
Confession: these photos are from my own ephemera collection. They have absolutely no connection with Dundee, but just serve as a reminder of the days when Sir John Leng’s competition was initiated. The photo at the top of this blog was taken in Wandsworth in 1906, the year of Leng’s death. These little tots probably weren’t being taught Scots songs by their elegant teacher. On the other hand, the children at the foot of this blog post look exactly the age that early Leng Prize competitors must have been! This postcard comes with no caption whatsoever.
My Leng Medal Memories research is funded by an Athenaeum Award from the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.
Exciting news. Thanks to CILIP’s Library and Information History Group, I shall be attending a fascinating conference in Stirling soon!
The conference is 17-18 April in Stirling, and the programme for ‘Reading and Book Circulation, 1650-1850’ is on their Events page:- borrowing.stir.ac.uk/events/
It’s of special interest to me because of my work on music borrowing at the University of St Andrews in the days of the old Copyright Libraries: I examined the borrowing habits of two particular women, Miss Elizabeth Lambert and Mrs Bertram, and contemplated the changing readership over the three and a half decades under examination. This work led into my successful application as Principal Investigator of an AHRC postdoctoral research network, the Claimed From Stationers’ Hall network (2017-2018) investigating music surviving from legal deposit in the old copyright libraries.
Here’s the big news I’ve been bursting to share! During Autumn 2023, I’m to be the first holder of the honorary Ketelbey research Fellowship in Late Modern History, in the University of St Andrews’ School of History. I’ll be there on Wednesdays and Thursdays for one semester, continuing to research and think about Scottish music publishers and other related topics, and enjoying the experience of being a research fellow in a very highly-rated university history department. St Andrews was rated the top UK university in the Times and Sunday Times Good University Guide last September, and the School of History came top in both the Times and Sunday Times rating, and the Guardian University Guide 2023 – so I’m dead chuffed! I’m an academic librarian and musicologist – I guess this means I can call myself halfway to being a historian, too.
The Fellowship is named after Doris Ketelbey (1896-1990), who was the first female academic in the School of History; a respected author; and had a phenomenal career for a woman of her times. Aileen Fyfe has written a blog post about her, which you can read here:-
Interestingly, Ketelbey taught at St Leonard’s School at one point. A few years ago, I wrote a blogpost for the EAERN Network about about the very first owner of a private school in the same premises, in the early 19th century: Mrs Bertram’s Music Borrowing. But the St Leonard’s that Ketelbey taught at would have been a more sophisticated institution than Mrs Bertram’s doubtlessly estimable establishment!
– and yes, she was the sister of composer Albert Ketelbey, who wrote an enormous quantity of lighter music and songs. I bet he was proud of his determined, high-achieving sister!
