Gentleman Amateur Composers
The great urban centers of the mid-Atlantic included cities like Philadelphia and Baltimore, and it was there that European classical traditions were best represented. Philip Phile, Johann Friedrich Peter and Alexander Reinagle were prominent composers of the era, though Francis Hopkinson, a signer of the Declaration of Independence from Philadelphia, remains the best-known. One of his compositions, "My Days Have Been So Wondrous Free", is well-remembered as the first art song from the United States (though this is disputed); it is, however, lacking in originality and innovation to set it apart from European compositions.
At the time, professional musicians were looked-down upon and considered coarse. Gentlemen performers played often, mostly for other aristocratic audiences, and without pay. As the United States developed, the south became the land of deep socioeconomic divisions. Land ownership and the possession of chattel slavery became an integral component of a gentleman's livelihood, while in the north, the idea of a landed aristocracy never carried as much weight.
Read more about this topic: Music History Of The United States During The Colonial Era
Famous quotes containing the words gentleman, amateur and/or composers:
“There was a young lady of Joppa
Who came a society cropper.
She went to Ostend
With a gentleman friend—
And the rest of the story’s improper.”
—Anonymous.
“I have been reporting club meetings for four years and I am tired of hearing reviews of the books I was brought up on. I am tired of amateur performances at occasions announced to be for purposes either of enjoyment or improvement. I am tired of suffering under the pretense of acquiring culture. I am tired of hearing the word “culture” used so wantonly. I am tired of essays that let no guilty author escape quotation.”
—Josephine Woodward, U.S. author. As quoted in Everyone Was Brave, ch. 3, by William L. O’Neill (1969)
“More significant than the fact that poets write abstrusely, painters paint abstractly, and composers compose unintelligible music is that people should admire what they cannot understand; indeed, admire that which has no meaning or principle.”
—Eric Hoffer (1902–1983)