Music publishing and book selling in Australia
Selections from the Monash University Library Collection
An exhibition to accompany the seminar Music publishing and book selling in Australia held at Monash University Library, Victoria - Friday 17 November 2000
Foyer, Ground Floor, Information Services Building, Sir Louis Matheson Library, Monash University. From November 2000 - February 2001
Allan and Co.
- Georgette Peterson (composer). Bush Songs of Australia: Songs for Young and Old. Words by Annie R. Rentoul ; illustrations by Ida S. Rentoul-Outhwaite. Melbourne : Allan & Co., [1924]
- Allan's Community Songs. Melbourne : Allan & Co., [1934-1939]
- Game, Peter. The Music Sellers. Melbourne: Hawthorn Press, 1976
Allans is a name synonymous with music selling and publishing in Australia. Begun in 1863, the enterprise still carries out this role. The pioneer of this significant force in the promotion of music at all levels in this country, was George Leavis Allan who arrived from England in 1852. After a stint at goldmining and music teaching, Allan joined Joseph Wilkie and his well established music warehouse in Collins Street, Melbourne, in 1863. Allan became the sole owner of the business in 1875 and from then on it expanded into selling and repairing instruments, offered teaching rooms and music sales. It moved into larger and more prestigious premises in 1877 and continued to prosper. In 1879 Allan introduced a music catalogue of publications from overseas and from local composers. Its compilation Australian yearbooks were best sellers, selling over 100,000 copies in 1900. Charles Tait, a director from 1896 contributed to the growth of the publishing arm and in 1922, a dedicated music printing plant was established by Alex Kynoch to print music specifically for Allans and its growing market.
Allan's Community Songs were extremely popular in the 1930s and a number of volumes were published for an eager public. The beautifully illustrated series of songbooks for children (represented here by Bush Songs of Australia) by composer Georgette Peterson were also very popular. Peterson was also an artist, singer and pianist. Born in Budapest, she studied at the Royal Budapest Academy. She became involved in the musical life of Melbourne as the wife of Franklin Peterson, Ormond Professor of Music at the University of Melbourne. She was choral conductor of the 1300 voice choir for the 1907 Australian Exhibition of Women's Work. The talented sisters, Annie Rentoul and Ida Rentoul-Outhwaite provided the lyrics and illustrations.
[Sources: Game, Peter. The Music Sellers. Melbourne: Hawthorn Press, 1976; Bebbington, Warren. Oxford Companion to Australian Music. Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1997; and Australian Dictionary of Biography, Vol. 11 1891-1939. Carlton; Melbourne University Press 1988.]
- Cristabel (composer, editor and arranger) Cole's Music of the Bells (2nd series). Melbourne : E. W. Cole, c.1898.
Edward William Cole (1832-1918) was 'the most amazing bookseller in the history of Australian publishing'. Arriving in 1852 as a goldrush immigrant he worked along the Murray River, eventually opening a bookshop in the Eastern Market, Melbourne, in 1865. In 1873 he opened the first Cole's Book Arcade and eventually moved in 1883 to its Bourke Street home. It was very successful not only offering books for sale, but operated as an amusement arcade encouraging customers to spend time browsing and amusing themselves. The publishing component of this exercise was very successful. Its most well known title is Cole's Funny Picture Book which found a place in the homes of most Victorians. A large range of music was published by E.W. Cole and the bright covers were an attractive feature and unusual for this period.
[Source: William H. Wilde, Joy Hooton, Barry Andrews, The Oxford Companion to Australian Literature. 2nd ed. Melbourne : Oxford University Press, 1994.]
Editions de L'Oiseau-Lyre
The Editions de L'Oiseau-Lyre (Lyre-Bird Press) was founded by Australian, Louise Hanson-Dyer, in Paris in the 1930s. Born in Melbourne in 1884, Hanson-Dyer became a patron of the arts, founder the British Music Society, encouraged young musicians and poets, and was involved with the Alliance Française and its cultural activities. In 1927, she and her husband left for England, later moving to Paris. Here she thrived, becoming involved in the cultural life of the city and encouraged musicians, composers and writers. Her interest in French music was indicated in the first publication of the Editions de L'Oiseau -Lyre - the complete works of Franç ois Couperin, a twelve volume set. Many other publications followed. These included early music (including Blow, Purcell, Byrd and works from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries) prompting an early music revival in Europe and twentieth century works by Canteloube, Koechlin and Milhaud. A number of Australian composers were promoted by the press including Margaret Sutherland and Peggy Glanville-Hicks. A complementary recording company was set up and many of the editions were recorded by leading musicians of Europe. The press moved to Monaco after the Second World War and still continues to publish and contribute scholarly publications which are studied and performed by musicians all over the world. Louise Hanson-Dyer died in Monaco in 1962.
- François Couperin. Oeuvres complètes: publiées par un groupe de musicologues, sous la direction de Maurice Cauchie. Paris : Editions de l'Oiseau-Lyre, 1932-33. 12 volumes
This was the first publication of the Editions de L'Oiseau-Lyre. It was published to celebrate the tercentenary of Couperin. The work includes the first use of the trademark end papers, depicting stylised lyre-bird feathers which were used in future publications of Editions de L'Oiseau-Lyre. Described as 'Smart Art Deco design, with a green curve in Cotswald green advancing upon a ground of light cream; a further green stripe ... down the right-hand side.'
Hanson-Dyer wrote to an English colleague of the edition:
that it will have a modern cover with an eighteenth century inside. I believe in this for we are doing it in our modern days and I never do like copies of anything. It is bound in a new material which one can wash.
- Polyphonies du XIIIe Siècle. Le manuscrit H 196 de la Facultè de Medecine de Montpellier. Editor, Yvonne Rokseth. Paris : Editions de l'Oiseau-Lyre (1935-1948) , 4 vols.
The Montpellier Codex, the original housed in the Faculty of Medicine at the Montpellier University in southern France, is the largest remaining collection of thirteenth century music. It was described in the Oiseau-Lyre advertising flyer as representing French music at 'the zenith of its brilliance and purity'. The provenance of the collection of 345 items in the codex is unknown before the eighteenth century, although it is known that the music was collated in the fourteenth century. The collection largely consists of motets, both sacred and secular. The musicologist Yvonne Rokseth, undertook the editing and transcribing of the work. The set was to win the first medal for French Antiquities awarded by the Institut de France.
This copy is one of a limited edition of 100 copies bound in Australian blackwood. Although not noted in the volumes, this Australian inspired binding was publisher, Louise Hanson-Dyer's contribution to celebrating the centenary of European settlement in Melbourne in 1934. In the process of importing the veneered wood into France, Hanson-Dyer had to deal with difficult French custom officials, high shipping costs and binders who complained that the wood was too heavy and difficult to work.
- Margaret Sutherland. They Called her Fair. Words by Esther Levy. Paris : Éditions de l'Oiseau Lyre, 1935.
Louise Hanson-Dyer and composer, Margaret Sutherland met while studying at the Albert Street Conservatorium in Melbourne. They worked together on a number of projects in Melbourne including recitals of Sutherland's music and publishing projects. She published Sutherland's best known work, the Sonata for Violin and Piano, a number of songs with settings by John Shaw-Neilson and Esther Levy, and small works for pipes. Dyer also promoted and published the works of another colleague Peggy Glanville Hicks, whom she had also met at the Albert Street Conservatorium.
[Source: Davison, Jim. Lyrebird Rising. Carlton, Vic: Miegunyah Press, 1994]
Henry Handel Richardson
- Bruce Steele and Richard Divall (editors), Musica Australis. Volume 4, Henry Handel Richardson the music part I & II. Melbourne: Marshall-Hall Trust, 1999.
- Bruce Steele and Richard Divall (editors), A collection of songs by Henry Handel Richardson for voice and piano. Sydney: Currency Press, 2000.
- Henry Handel Richardson, Christkindleins Wiegenlied : an old German carol. London : Ulysses Press, 1931
The two contemporary editions on display are part of the Monash University Henry Handel Richardson Project under the direction of Clive Probyn and Bruce Steele and funded by the Australian Research Council and Dame Elisabeth Murdoch. The project aims to produce critical editions of the works and correspondence of Henry Handel Richardson (HHR - 1870-1946). HHR was the name adopted by the Australian author and composer Mrs Ethel Florence Lindesay Robertson (née Richardson). Author of the novels Getting of Wisdom, Maurice Guest and Fortunes of Richard Mahoney amongst others, she was also a composer of numerous works for voice and piano and other musical combinations. Only one of her songs was published in her lifetime. Christkindleins Wiegenlied : an old German carol appeared in a limited facsimile edition of 250 bound in Javanese paper. She sent many as personal Christmas greetings to her friends in 1931. The selection of the songs for the recent publications edited by Steele and Divall represent her settings of English and German poems from the late 1890s to 1943.
- Hugh Anderson. Australian song index, 1828-1956; decorations by Ron Edwards. Ferntree Gully [Vic.] : Rams Skull Press, 1957. The Black Bull Chapbooks ; no. 7
- J. Manifold, Bandicoot Ballads. Ferntree Gully [Vic.] : Rams Skull Press, 1953. Lino-cut illustration by R.G. Edwards.
Hugh Anderson is described as 'one of the seminal figures in the study of Australian folksong and ballad'. Since the early 1950s he has been involved in the writing, editing and collaboration of over 60 publications on Australian folksong, ballad, folklore, biography and criticism. The Black Bull Chapbooks were published by the Rams Skull Press (between 1954 and 1957, most with music and notes researched and written by Anderson and illustrations by fellow folk musician, craftsman and artist, Ron Edwards. The Rams Skull Press was established by Ron Edwards in Ferntree Gully in the early 1950s and amongst its first publications were the pioneering series of broadsheets, 'Bandicoot Ballads', a collaboration between Edwards and John Manifold. Manifold played a pioneering role in ensuring that Australian bush songs were collected and published. His publications The Penguin Australia Songbook and Who Wrote the Ballads? (1964) are still considered major works in the study of Australian folksong.
[Source: Gwenda Beed Davey and Graham Seal (editors). The Oxford Companion to Australian Folklore. Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1993]
Around the Boree Log
- Around the Boree Log: A collection of 20 songs with piano accompaniment. Music by Dom Stephen Moreno, Words by 'John O'Brien'. New Norcia, W.A. : Benedictine Community , 1933.
- The Miniature Edition of Around the Boree Log: A collection of 20 songs with piano accompaniment. Music by Dom Stephen Moreno, Words by 'John O'Brien'. Sydney: Pellegrini & Co, 1933
- O'Brien, John. Around the Boree Log : And Other Verses, 28th ed. Sydney : Angus and Robertson, 1953.
The composer of the twenty songs in the song series, Around the Boree Log, Dom Stephen Moreno O.S.B., was a Spanish Benedictine monk and musician who travelled to Australia to live and work at the Benedictine Monastery in New Norcia in Western Australia. He was musical director at the Monastery for many years and composed liturgical music and some secular works. In 1933 he undertook to arrange the collections of poems, Around the Boree Log by 'John O'Brien', which had been published by Angus and Robertson in 1921 with great success. The songs were published by the Benedictine Community in 1933 and were also published by Pellegrini and Co., the Catholic booksellers in Sydney. The Catholic Press (September 7, 1933) gave the publication strong exposure describing them as 'rare gems of art ... The range of sentiments is very wide ... It was a happy thought of his to choose for his composition this wonderful book which is the very incarnation of Australian life, a book in which the joys and sorrows of our south land are so admirable described.'
'John O'Brien' was the pseudonym of Patrick Joseph Hartigan (1878-1952) a Catholic priest who worked most of his life in country New South Wales. He published two volumes of verse under this pseudonym including Around the Boree Log and The Parish of St Mel's (1954), which was a tribute to his Narrandera parish. The poetry was 'simple, homely balladry centred on the Irish-Australian, Catholic, rurual communities'.
[Source: William H. Wilde, Joy Hooton, Barry Andrews, The Oxford Companion to Australian Literature. 2nd ed. Melbourne : Oxford University Press, 1994.]
- The Southern Euphrosyne and Australian Miscellany: containing oriental moral tales, original anecdote, poetry and music, an historical sketch with examples of native aboriginal melodies put into modern rhythm and harmonized as solos, quartettes, &c. together with several other original vocal pieces, arranged to a piano-forte accompaniment by the editor and sole proprietor, I Nathan. (Sydney, Nathan, 1849)
Isaac Nathan (born Canterbury, UK 1790? - Died Sydney, Australia 1864), was a composer, singer and teacher. He arrived in Australia in 1841 with a well established reputation, as author of a respected book on vocal technique Musurgia Vocalis (1823), composer of A Selection of Hebrew Melodies... (1815-16) and leaving behind significant debts in England. Nathan made his mark in colonial Sydney as a church choir director, composer, conductor and critic. His opera Don John of Austria was performed in 1847 in Sydney and was described as the 'first opera wholly performed in Australia'. He also undertook pioneering work with settings of music of the Australian aborigines.
The Southern Euphrosyne includes both musical components and embittered details of Nathan's personal affairs, affidavits from supporters and stories of his Jewish heritage. The most significant aspect of this book is the publication of his aboriginal transcriptions with annotations. In adding harmonies and rhythmic strictures and the 'versifying' of the words, the original music has been obscured, so that the result is a set of songs representative of the typical nineteenth century song genre, perhaps reflecting the colonial attitudes to the original inhabitants of Australia through this transmogrification.
- Charles Edward Horsley. Quartet for two violins viola and violoncello. Melbourne: Musical Australiana Press, 1979.
This shortlived press was founded in Ballarat in 1979 by pianist and musicologist, Kathleen Brady and printer, Geoffrey Zilles. Quartet for two violins viola and violoncello by Edward Horsley was the first production of this press which aimed to produce facsimiles of compositions with an Australian connection. Charles Edward Horsely, born in London in 1822, arrived in Australia in 1861 with a reputation as an organist and composer of some note. He was conductor of the Melbourne Philharmonic Society from 1862- 1865, organist at St Francis Church and contributed to the musical components of the 1866 Melbourne Exhibition. His masque Euterpe was performed at the opening of the Melbourne Town Hall in 1870. He returned to England in 1871.
Little is known of the history of this Quartet. The manuscript has Horsley's presentation inscription and it reads '...not old but very sincere friend, Charles Edward Horsley, Melbourne, Victoria, March 26, 1862.' Unfortunately the top line of the inscription is unable to be read. The manuscript paper is watermarked 1856, dating the work as being composed between 1856 and March 1862. Horsley had been in Australia three and a half months when the manuscript was inscribed and so it is possible that the work may have been written in Melbourne.
[From notes by Therese Radic in the foreward of Charles Edward Horsley. Quartet for two violins viola and violoncello. Melbourne: Musica Australiana Press, 1979.]
- W.J. Banks The Australian Musical Album 1894 (Sydney, 1894)
This was to be number one of a series, but unfortunately no others were published. It was designed as a publication for giving and sending back to the 'home' country - to promote the colonies with examples of up to date musical styles and artistic representations of the sophisticated buildings and gardens. It contains works by many of the musicians practicing in Sydney at the time, including August Wiegand, Henri Kowalski, Albert Wentzel, Horace Poussard, Hugo Alpen, Alice Charbonnet-Kellermann, Esther Kahn and Reene Less. Part of the importance of this Album consists in the 'Biographical Notes' on many of the contributors. The cover shows a view of Sydney Harbour, looking over the Botanical Gardens to Farm Cove, by Albert Fullwood.
- Walch's Tasmanian Almanac for 1884
- Wood's Royal Southern Kalandar, Tasmanian Register and General Australasian and East Indian Official Directory. Van Diemen's Land : Henry Dowling , Jun. Launceston ; J. W. H. Walch, Hobart Town, 1850.
The firm, taken over by Major Walch and his sons from Samuel Augustus Tegg at the beginning of 1846, was to play an important role in the selling and publishing of music in the later nineteenth century. The advertisements in these almanacs illustrate the extensive range of activities of Walch and Sons, including the sale of 'music paper, music books etc' and pianos and organs. The development of the music side of the business between the 1840s and the 1880s is quite clear from the material displayed.
[Notes on Walch's by Wallace Kirsop]
- Australian Musical News (Melbourne, 1911-1963)
- Lina Marsi. Index to the Australian Musical News 1911-1963 (Melbourne : Lima Press, 1990)
- Australian Jazz Quarterly, nos 1-24 (Melbourne, W.H.Miller, 1946-54)
- Jazz Notes, nos. 39-59 (Melbourne, City Service Press, 1944-45); nos. 61-113 (Adelaide, John W. Rippon, 1946-62)
The Australian Musical News (also published as Music and Dramatic News, Australian Music and Dramatic News and Music and Dance), provides an unsurpassed coverage of Australian musical life during its period of publication, from 1911-1963. It was published by the Melbourne music firm, Allans.
Despite the importance of this journal to the documentation of Australian music life, it is believed that there is no complete set extant in either private or library collections. Until 1991, in order to gain a complete coverage of the journal, researchers had to go from library to library to seek individual issues or runs. In 1991, a new Australian music course was introduced in the Monash University Department of Music. Seeding funding was sought to support the introduction of this new course and to provide resources for the academics and students to utilise in their study and research. The then Music Librarian, Helen O'Donoghue, undertook to piece together a complete set of the Australian Musical News from collections and libraries around Australia in order to make a master microfilm copy. (The complete run of the Australian Musical News is now available in microfilm or microfiche for purchase, enabling researchers and libraries, archives and museums to access a source which was once a logistical nightmare for researchers and is now an invaluable resource for Australian music history. Enquiries regarding the purchase of the Australian Musical News can be made to the Music and Multimedia Librarian, Monash University).
A valuable Index to the Australian Musical News 1911-1963 was compiled and published by Lina Marsi in 1990. It has provided access to a wealth of information about performers, composers, events, organisations and is a valuable tool for historians and researchers of the performing arts in Australia and has also provided a source for many genealogists.
Australian Jazz Quarterly, (no.1, 1946 - no. 24, 1954) was purchased by the Music Library in 1995. Described as 'a magazine for the Connoisseur of Hot Music' it was 'devoted purely to jazz essays, criticism, biographies and similar features ... and catered particularly for Australian fans'. It ran until 1965. AJQ was edited and published by William H Miller, a Melbourne lawyer. Miller went to Oxford in 1933 and frequented the rhythm clubs and record shops in London until his return to Australia in 1938. With a library of about six hundred jazz records, he began broadcasting on 3UZ in a weekly spot called 'Jazz Night' and became influential in his support of traditional jazz which was making a revival in Australia after the Second World War. Contributors included active performers Graeme and Roger Bell.
AJQ eventually incorporated Jazz Notes, the organ of the 3UZ Jazz Lovers Club which was originally edited by Miller and later by C. Ian Turner. It also began to incorporate the official program of the Australia Jazz Convention, which had begun in 1946. AJQ and Jazz Notes provide insight into the traditional jazz movement in Australia and particular Melbourne after the Second World War.
[Sources: Australian Jazz Quarterly; and Andrew Bisset, Black Roots White Flowers: A History of Jazz in Australia, Sydney, Golden Press, 1979.]
Exhibition and notes devised and written by Georgina Binns, Music and
Multimedia Librarian, Sir Louis Matheson Library, Monash University,
Clayton, Victoria, 3800
Phone: 03 9905 3236. Fax: 03 9905 9142 Email:
georgina.binns@lib.monash.edu.au
© Monash University Library November 2000
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