Music Collections in Leeds: From the Local to the Global (Symposium)

The musical collections of the University Libraries, Leeds Central Library and Leeds City Museum are rich in materials but the fragmented nature of their holdings has obscured their significance.

The two-day symposium explores the musical collections and contexts of these libraries. Perhaps the best-known musical holdings at the University of Leeds are its autograph manuscripts of Felix Mendelssohn. Less well known is the fact that the Mendelssohn manuscripts came to Leeds as part of a larger collection created by the Sheffield-based musician and collector W.T. Freemantle. Freemantle’s music collections, which also include manuscripts in the hands of William Croft, Charles Dibden, E. J. Loder, Michael Costa and rich holdings of printed material, along with material relating to his own life as a musician, formed the basis of the music section within the Brotherton Collection. 

Since that time other musical collections of note have been added to the library’s holdings, including materials of Herbert Thompson and Ernest Bradbury, music critics for The Yorkshire Post from 1886 to 1936 and 1947 to 1984 respectively, the Denis ApIvor archive and the Novello Cowden Clarke Collection. More recent acquisitions include archives relating to the Leeds International Piano Competition, Dame Fanny Waterman, and Opera North. The Leeds Central Library holds the Taphouse Collection of rare manuscripts and printed music mostly of the eighteenth century, the Frank Kidson Collection and Victorian Song Collection. This two-day symposium will explore these collections and their contexts and will help to encourage further research into them.

The first day will end with a concert of the music of Denis ApIvor at 17.30, led by the guitarist James Woodrow, who worked with ApIvor and for whom ApIvor wrote music. Woodrow will be joined by Chris O’Gorman (tenor), Andrew Zolinski (keyboard), Michael Cox (flute) and Paul Silverthorne (viola). The concert will be followed by a reception for delegates. 

On the second day, at 13.00 there will be a concert of Restoration Theatre music by members of Leeds Baroque. The concert will include works by Louis Grabu (fl. 1665-1694) and Gottfried Finger (1655/56-1730) which are unique to the Leeds Partbooks, a set of four manuscripts copied around the turn of the eighteenth century held in the Leeds Central Library.

Talks, day 1 (10.00-19.00, CCCH, School of Music):
Bryan White: W.T. Freemantle, his collections and editions of Louis Spohr’s Twenty-Fourth’s Psalm
John Cunningham: Freemantle’s Charles Dibdin Collection
Fiona Smith: The Partington Sisters: a little known photographic collection deriving from W.T. Freemantle 
Michael Allis: Mining gems in the Brotherton Collections: Thomas Wingham’s Elegy on the Death of Sir Sterndale Bennett (1875) 
Barbara Kelly: Winning Women at the Leeds International Piano Competition: local and global reputations
Katie Gardner: Opera North Archive
Oliver Chandler: Denis ApIvor: Britain’s Schoenberg?

Talks, day 2 (9.30-16.30, Music Library in Leeds Central Library):
Kitty Ross: Forgotten Songs: Unlocking Leeds Museums sheet music collections
Derek Scott: Victorian Sheet Music
Peter Holman: Discovering a Collection of Restoration Theatre Music: The Leeds Partbooks
Chris Nickson: Frank Kidson: A Leeds Musical Pioneer

An open call has been issued for additional papers:
https://goldenpages.miraheze.org/wiki/Leeds_Music_Collections:_From_the_Local_to_the_Global

To register, please visit: https://www.ticketsource.co.uk/uolconcerts/t-gavanme