My first visit to the Royal Philharmonic Society’s archive; a
wealth of scores, letters, papers and miscellanea that trace its 200-year
history of music-making and commissioning, was well overdue. In truth, my overriding
memory of archives is of long hours spent in search of the magic
document which would transform my thesis into a revelatory masterwork (alas, it
proved elusive). However, even a superficial exploration of the RPS collection,
under the expert guidance of RPS council member and British Library curator Nicolas
Bell (and free of impending deadlines), offered a fascinating window on UK concert
performance history.
Sold to the British Library in 2002, and so providing the
RPS with the stable financial foundation it had lacked throughout its past, the
collection is now housed in the library’s cavernous basement, which extends to
a depth of over 24 metres. A conveyor belt system whirrs overhead as
publications (the library owns over 150 million in total) are ferried across
the building. Among the 270 scores in the RPS archive is the autograph
manuscript of Mendelssohn’s First Symphony, which the composer presented to the
Society after giving the work’s premiere with them in 1829. The collection also
includes autographs by nineteenth-century composers who have stood the test of
time less well: Ignaz Pleyel, Cherubini, Sigismund Neukomm, Spohr, Cipriani
Potter and William Sterndale Bennett.
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| Musician fees among the financial papers |
Equally revealing are the documents relating to the
day-to-day running of the Society. Minutes which (once you have deciphered the
fountain pen scrawl) describe, for example, concern over whether or not to
invite Richard Wagner to conduct the orchestra in 1855. (He came, but the
experience was mutually disagreeable.) From a seemingly insignificant list of the Society's orchestral players, it is possible to gauge a surprising
amount about the orchestra in the early nineteenth century, from the quantity, hierarchy
and fees of the players, to the Germanic and Italian names suggesting musicians
who had come from abroad.
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| A lock of hair from Ludwig |
There’s also some downright weird stuff, such as the strands
of Beethoven’s hair gifted to the Philharmonic Society; one of many keepsakes taken from the composer's death bed. Of far more historical significance is the score of his Ninth Symphony,
sent by Beethoven to the Society in 1824. It carries his autograph dedication
to the society and the copyists’ work is liberally corrected in Beethoven’s
hand. Other composers had a less productive relationship with the Society. I
stumbled across a letter from a young and relatively unknown Edward Elgar, who
was ‘naturally anxious to obtain a hearing in London at the Philharmonic’. The
response clearly displeased him; a subsequent letter affirmed ‘I, of course, do
not intend to “submit” any composition of music to the judgement of your “Directors”
(although the relationship would later flourish with Elgar’s rising success).
With such treasures, the RPS archive provides an important record of repertory and
performance practice, and of historic decisions regarding the Society’s role, membership,
commissions and collaborations - decisions which continue to be made today. Who knows what researchers will be uncovering in the RPS archive another two hundred years down the line...
Helen Pearce
With thanks to Nicolas Bell and the British Library
Discover more on the RPS website
