| Music Hall is a form of British theatrical entertainment which
reached its peak of popularity between 1850 and 1960. The term can refer to
- A particular form of variety entertainment involving a mixture of
popular song, comedy and speciality acts;
- The theatre or other venue in which such entertainment takes place;
- The type of popular music normally associated with such performances.
Origins
Music Hall in London had its beginnings in the entertainments provided at summer fairs
such as the Bartholomew Fair from the 17th century onward. Many of these were suppressed under the strict puritan rule of the Commonwealth. Upon the Restoration of the monarchy in 1660, restrictions on public entertainment were relieved by patents for play-acting granted to Thomas Killigrew and William Davenant by
Charles II. The fairs, much cheaper entertainment within
the reach of poor working people, were also tolerated again. The patentees had commodious new playhouses built at Drury Lane and Dorset Garden, well-equipped for specialty entertainment and offering music, dancing, and circus-type
entr'actes from the first, as well as plays. By the early 18th century, Londoners' interest in music, dancing, singing, jugglers,
rope-dancers, high-kickers, and fair-booth burlesque, had all but driven out legitimate drama.
Inns and taverns developed into independent places of amusement and laid the foundations of the middle-class and lower
middle-class institution of the music hall, originally evolving from the "song and supper" rooms of the 1850s. The heyday of Music Hall lasted from the 1850s to the Second World War, when other forms of popular music evolved and Music Hall began to be replaced by films as the most popular form of
entertainment.
British Music Hall was similar to American vaudeville, featuring rousing
songs and comic acts, while in the United Kingdom the term vaudeville referred to more lowbrow entertainment that would
have been termed burlesque in the United States.
History of the songs
The musical forms most associated with Music Hall evolved from traditional folk song, becoming by the 1850's a distinct
musical style. Subject matter became more contemporary and humorous, and accompaniment was provided by larger house-orchestras as
increasing affluence gave the lower classes more access to commercial entertainment and to a wider range of musical instruments,
including the piano. The consequent change in musical taste from traditional to more
professional forms of entertainment arose in response to the rapid industrialisation and urbanisation of previously
rural populations during the industrial revolution. The
newly created urban communities, cut off from their cultural roots, required new and readily accessible forms of
entertainment.
Music Halls were originally bar rooms which provided entertainment, in the form of music and speciality acts, for their patrons. By the middle years of the nineteenth century the first purpose-built music halls were being built in London. The halls created a demand for new and catchy popular songs that could no longer be met from the traditional
folk song repertoire. Professional songwriters were enlisted to fill the gap.
The emergence of a distinct music hall style can be credited to a fusion of musical influences. Music hall songs needed to
gain and hold the attention of an often jaded and unruly urban audience. In America from the 1840s Stephen Foster had reinvigorated folk song with the
admixture of negro spiritual to produce a new and vibrant form of popular song.
Songs like Golden Slippers and The Old Folks at Home spread round the globe, taking with them the idiom and
appertenances of the minstrel song. Other influences on the rapidly-developing
music hall idiom were Irish and European music, particularly the jig, polka, and waltz.
Typically a music hall song consists of a series of verses sung by the performer
alone, and a repeated chorus which carries the principal melody, and in which the audience is encouraged to join.
In Britain, the first music hall songs often promoted the alcoholic wares of the owners of the halls in which they were
performed. Songs like Glorious Beer, and the first major music hall success, Champagne
Charlie, in 1854, had a major influence in establishing the new art form. Champagne
Charlie is often credited with inspiring an exasperated William Booth
to form the Salvation Army, eliciting his famous quotation: "Why should
the devil have all the good tunes?"
By the 1870's the songs had cut themselves free from their folk music roots, and particular songs also started to become
associated with particular singers, often with exclusive contracts with the songwriter, just as many pop songs are today.
Towards the end of the style the music became influenced by ragtime and jazz, before being overtaken by them.
Music Hall songs were often unashamedly aimed at their working class audiences, reflecting the experiences and humour in their
daily lives. Songs like My Old Man (said Follow the Van), Knocked 'em in the Old Kent Road, and Waiting at the
Church, expressed in melodic form situations that the urban poor were very familiar with. Music Hall songs could be romantic,
patriotic, humorous or sentimental, as the need arose. The most popular Music Hall songs became the basis for the Pub songs of the typical Cockney "knees up".
The two eras
Music Hall entertainment is sometimes divided by era into Victorian Music Hall and Edwardian Music Hall. Toward the end of its
heyday the terms theatrical variety or revue began to be used.
Music Hall began as a largely working class entertainment, and its
association with beer halls and gin palaces led to it being initially shunned by polite society. As Music Hall grew in popularity
and respectability, the original arrangement of a large hall with tables at which drink was served, changed to that of a
drink-free auditorium. The acceptance of Music Hall as a legitimate cultural
form was sealed by the first Royal Variety
Performance before King George V in
1912.
The pressure for greater rewards for music hall songwriters led to the application of copyright law to musical compositions. This in turn boosted the music publication industry, and
the sale of music in printed form. The term Tin Pan Alley, for the music
publication industry gained currency from the practice of rival publishers of banging together pots and pans in order to disrupt
their competitors' musical auditions.
World War I is considered by many to have been the high-water-mark of
Music Hall popularity. Music Hall artists and composers threw themselves into rallying public support and enthusiasm for the war
effort. Patriotic Music Hall compositions like Keep the Home Fires Burning, Pack up Your Troubles, It's a Long Way to Tipperary and We Don't
Want to Lose You (but we think you ought to Go), were sung by the soldiers in the trenches and by audiences at home. After
the war, Music Hall suffered in the reaction against the high casualties and apparent pointlessness of the conflict. To some,
Music Hall seemed tainted by the way in which it had been used to encourage recruitment and bolster the war.
Music Hall continued through the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s, but no longer as the single dominant form of popular entertainment in
Britain. It now had to compete with Jazz, Swing and Big Band dance music, as well as with cinema. Even so, it gave rise to such major stars as George Formby, Gracie Fields, Max Miller, and Flanagan and Allen during this period.
After World War II, competition from television and other musical idioms, including Rock and
Roll, led to the slow demise of the British music halls. The final blow came when Moss Empires, the largest British
Music Hall chain, closed the majority of its theatres in 1960. Stage and Film musicals, however, continued to be influenced by the music hall idiom. Oliver!, Dr Dolittle, My Fair Lady, and many other musicals continued to retain strong roots in music
hall. The BBC series The Good Old
Days, which ran for thirty years, recreated the Music Hall for the modern audience.
- George Le Brunn, writer
of Oh! Mr Porter!
- Noel Gay, writer of Lambeth Walk, There's Something About a Soldier, Leaning
on a Lamppost.
- Harry Lauder, writer of Stop your Tickling Jock, I Love A
Lassie.
- Fred W Leigh, composer of
Don't Dilly Dally and The Army of Today.
- Arthur Lloyd, over 100 songs.
- Felix Powell, writer of
Pack up Your Troubles
- Joseph Tabrar, writer of Daddy Wouldn't Buy Me a Bow Wow
Music Hall comedy
The typical Music Hall comedian is a bloke (women weren't all that common in comedy in those days!) dressed in a stripped suit
who usually interrupts another bloke. The phrases 'I don't wish to know that!' and Kindly leave the stage refer to this
period. In fact most of stand up comedy started in this period, and many of today's traditions such as heckling, finishing on a
song as well as character comedy dates from this period. Programmes such as The
Goons made use of the Music Hall Tradition.
Music Hall performers
Music Hall in literature, drama, and screen
The Victorian era was celebrated by the 1944 film Champagne Charlie while J. B. Priestley's 1965 novel Lost Empires evokes the world of Edwardian
music hall just before the start of World War I; the title is a reference to the Empire theatres (as well as foreshadowing the
decline of the British Empire itself). It was recently adapted as a television miniseries, shown in both the UK and in the U.S.
as a PBS presentation. Priestley's 1929 novel The Good Companions, set in
the same period, follows the lives of the members of a "concert party" or touring "Pierrot troupe."
John Osborne's play The Entertainer portrays the life and work of a second-rate music hall comedian.
The term Music Hall is also used to describe some large musical venues, such as the Paris Olympia and Radio City Music
Hall.
|
