A Study of British Influence on Musical Taste and Programming: New Choral Works Introduced to Audiences by the Melbourne Philharmonic Society, 1876–1901

Abstract

When the Annual Report of Melbourne Philharmonic for 1899 complained about the lack of public support for new musical enterprises of the Society, it stated that more encouragement of the local press was needed so that ‘public curiosity might be excited, an artistic taste educated, and a desire created to hear what the Old World had approved’ (my italics). The domination of British opinion in the assembly of a music library for the Melbourne Philharmonic Society during the years of its existence in the nineteenth century, focusing upon the years 1876 to 1901, is investigated in Part I of this article. Factors influencing the choice of repertoire during this era – particularly the influence of the British publication The Musical Times and Singing-Class Circular (founded in 1844) – are noted. Examination of reports and reviews in the Musical Times supports the hypothesis that much of the new repertoire acquired by the Melbourne Philharmonic Society during these years was the direct result of opinions expressed in that publication, and the availability of performance materials publicized by Novello, Ewer, and Co. through the Musical Times, which was also published by Novello. ‘What J. Alfred Novello had on offer was unashamedly a house magazine … firmly dedicated to the advertisement of Novello's publications’. In the cultivation of musical taste, and in the development of libraries of choral societies, the activities of the publisher extended an authority far beyond the UK, placing the Musical Times in a formidable position of power throughout the English-speaking world. Part II explores three works to receive their Australian or Melbourne premieres at concerts given by the Philharmonic Society in the final quarter of the nineteenth century: each item was promulgated by the Musical Times.