Music-Hall

Music-Hall, type of variety entertainment which flourished in England during the second half of the 19th century. It evolved from the ‘sing-songs’ held in taverns, and arose from the desire of tavern landlords to emulate the success of the ‘song-and-supper rooms’ of which Evans's was typical. It was at first housed in a hall or annexe adjoining some popular public-house, where the customers sat at small tables to eat and drink while enjoying the comic turns, ballad-singers, acrobats, and jugglers, all controlled by a chairman.

As music-hall became even more popular, special theatres or ‘palaces of variety’ were built to accommodate it. The first was the Canterbury, built by Charles Morton, known as ‘the father of the halls’. Later outstanding ones in London were the Alhambra and the Empire, famous also for their ballets, the Holborn Empire, the London Pavilion, the Bedford, the Metropolitan, the Middlesex or ‘Old Mo’, the Oxford, Gatti's, and the Tivoli. At one time every town and suburb had its Empire or Hippodrome. The last to be built was the Chiswick Empire in 1912, its three-tier auditorium, typical of many all over London, seating 2,000.

The stars who made the ‘halls’ and were made by them were as many and diverse as the buildings themselves. At first singers such as Sam Collins and Sam Cowell (1820–64) came in from the ‘song-and-supper rooms’, which also gave the music-hall its first comedian in ‘blackface’, Joe Cave [ Joseph Cave (1823–1912), later manager of the Marylebone Music-Hall, as well as Harry Clifton (1832–72), who wrote the words and music of ‘Pretty Polly Perkins of Paddington Green’ and sang ‘motto’ songs such as ‘Paddle Your Own Canoe’, and Victor Liston (1838–1913), who popularized Fred Albert's ‘Shabby Genteel’ (‘Too proud to beg, too honest to steal’), which was much admired by Edward VII when Prince of Wales. It was not long before the music-hall was making its own stars and its own stereotypes. One of the latter, which replaced for a time the earlier stereotype of the tough, good-hearted working-man, was the ‘man-about-town’, the ‘West End toff’. This was the invention of George Leybourne and the Great Vance ( Alfred Vance [ Alfred Peck Stevens], 1840–88), whose versatility covered also Cockney and ‘motto’ songs.

One of the interesting features of the early music-hall was its employment of women singers, and later comediennes, in its programmes. Women had been seen rarely, if ever, at the Coal Hole and Cyder Cellars and suchlike male resorts, probably not even at Evans's, which reluctantly, in the late 1860s, had allowed women with a male escort to sit in the auditorium behind a grille. But from the early days of the Canterbury, and later at the Oxford, Morton engaged Emily Soldene (1840–1912) to sing excerpts from light opera. She was the forerunner of such almost forgotten stars as Bessie Bellwood [ Elizabeth Ann Katherine Mahony] (1847–96), who was turned down at the Holborn for being ‘too quiet’, but later learned to belt out such Cockney songs as ‘Wot Cheer, ‘Ria!’, and Jenny Hill [ Elizabeth Pasta] (1851–96), a diminutive, sharp-featured little creature, billed as ‘the Vital Spark’, whose early privations, combined with the frenzy with which she sang and danced once she became famous, contributed to her early death. The work of such performers as these came to perfection in Marie Lloyd, to many the finest of all music-hall's comic women singers.

Although, understandably, it is the great solo performers of the music-hall who are mainly remembered, the many ‘turns’ on a normal evening's bill—sometimes as many as 20 to 25 at a time—were all different, comprising alone or in groups every type of acrobat, juggler, conjurer, ventriloquist, speciality dancer, slapstick or knockabout comedian, and singers who ran the gamut from vulgar, often suggestive, comic songs to serious ballads. The old ‘song-and-supper rooms’ had featured little but singers, with an occasional acrobat, conjurer, or ventriloquist, and it is to the music-hall of the second half of the 19th century onwards that the greatest of these last three groups belong, among them Jules Léotard (1830–70), Charles Blondin [ Jean François Gravelet] (1824–97), Paul Cinquevalli [ Paul Kestner] (1859–1918), and Fred Russell [ Thomas Frederick Parnell] (1862–1957). Léotard, first seen in London in 1861 at the Alhambra, where his grace and agility captured all hearts, has been immortalized in the song ‘The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze’, and his name is now given to the sober one-piece practice costume, adopted by acrobats and ballet-dancers, which he always wore. The only person to approach him in daring and popularity was Blondin, who also appeared at the Alhambra, in 1862. Cinquevalli, a German by birth, also began as the acrobat, but after an accident became probably the greatest juggler of all time, his skill with everything from a billiard ball to a cannon ball being universally recognized. His contemporary Fred Russell, who made his first appearance with his doll ‘Coster Joe’ in 1896, soon became ‘top of the bill’ wherever he appeared.

The 1870s and 1880s saw the rise to popularity of many stars now forgotten, or remembered for one or two songs only, such as William B. Fair (1851–1909), with ‘Tommy, Make Room for Your Uncle’, which he sang at as many as six ‘halls’ in one night, and Charles Coborn [ Colin Whitton McCallum] (1852–1945), with ‘Two Lovely Black Eyes’ and ‘The Man Who Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo’. Among those who came to the music-halls from the minstrel show, retaining their ‘blackface’ make-up, were George H. Chirgwin (1854–1922), originally known as ‘the White-Eyed Musical Moke’, but from 1877 billed as ‘the White-Eyed Kaffir’ because of the white lozenge-shaped patch round his right eye, who accompanied himself on the one-string fiddle while he sang sentimental ‘coon’ songs, of which the favourites were ‘The Blind Boy’ and ‘My Fiddle is My Sweetheart’, sung in a high-pitched, piping voice; and slightly later Eugene Stratton [ Eugene Augustus Ruhlman] (1861–1918), who also sang ‘coon’ songs, the best remembered being ‘Lily of Laguna’, to which he whistled a refrain while dancing a ‘soft-shoe shuffle’ in a spotlight on a darkened stage. Harry Champion (1866–1942), on the other hand, soon discarded his ‘blackface’, and after making a hit with such songs as ‘Ginger, Ye're Barmy' and ‘I'm ‘Enery the Eighth I am, I am’, is mainly remembered for his songs in praise of food—‘Boiled Beef and Carrots’, ‘Hot Tripe and Onions’—which he sang at terrific speed and with great zest and vitality up to the day of his death.

At a time when Britain was at the height of her prosperity, patriotic songs, particularly when sung by a handsome man in army or naval uniform, formed part of the staple fare of the halls. Among the best-known singers of such songs was The Great Macdermott [ Gilbert Hastings Farrell] (1845–1901), whose ‘We Don't Want to Fight, but By Jingo! if we do' added the word ‘Jingoism’ to the English language. Charles Godfrey [ Paul Lacey] (1851–1900), who came from the theatre to sing ‘Masher King’ in 1880, dressed in silk knee-breeches and buckled shoes, but also put on uniform for the descriptive scena songs in which he excelled, among them ‘Poor Old Benjamin’, about a veteran of the Crimean War. He reversed the process adopted by Arthur Roberts (1852–1933), who left the music-halls in 1880 to go on the stage, but returned to them in 1903 to become a ‘Veteran of Variety’. Another handsome singer of naval songs, Tom Costello (1863–1945), was famous in his own day for ‘Comrades’, but is now better remembered as the henpecked husband in ‘At Trinity Church I Met Me Doom’. Undoubtedly one of the outstanding figures of the ‘halls’ in the last 15 years of the 19th century was Dan Leno, who made his first adult appearance in a London music-hall in 1885, the same year as Marie Lloyd. For many people these two epitomize the spirit of the ‘halls’ at their best, and also highlight that connection between music-hall and pantomime which was to be a marked feature of the next 30 years or more.

The 1890s saw the arrival of many stars who were to survive into the 20th century, among them Mark Sheridan (?–1917), who in top hat, frock coat, and bell-bottomed trousers strapped below the knee sang Cockney songs with rousing choruses, of which the best-remembered are ‘Oh, I Do Like to be beside the Seaside’ and ‘Here We Are, Here We Are, Here We Are Again’, to which the troops marched during the First World War. He was first seen in London in 1891, as were Richard Knowles (1858–1919), born in Canada, who billed himself as ‘the very peculiar American comedian’, and wore a shabby black frock-coat, opera hat, and white duck trousers as he strode about the stage singing at the top of his voice songs such as ‘Girly-Girly’ and ‘Brighton’; and the great comedian Albert Chevalier, who brought back the homespun Cockney comedian. In the same year Gus Elen [ Ernest Augustus Elen] (1862–1940), known till then as a ‘blackface’ comedian, left off his Negro make-up and reinforced Chevalier's picture of the rollicking costermonger with ‘Never Introduce Yer Donah to a Pal’. Some of his characterizations were truly Dickensian, among them ‘’E Dunno Where ‘E Are’, ‘If It Wasn't For the ‘Ouses in Between’, and ‘Wait Till the Work Comes Round’. Among the feminine equivalents of Chevalier was the much-loved Kate Carney (1868–1950), who, dressed in a coster suit of ‘pearlies’ and a vast hat with towering feathers, sang ‘Liza Johnson’ and ‘Three Pots a Penny’.

As Cockney songs returned to the ‘halls’, the elegant silhouette of the ‘man-about-town’, which had been in partial eclipse since the days of Leybourne and Vance, also returned, but this time in the form of male impersonation, of which Nellie Power (1855–87) and Bessie Bonehill (?–1902) were early examples, and Vesta Tilley the supreme exponent. Other examples were Ella Shields (1879–1952), who took Vesta Tilley's West End Burlington Bertie and made him a pathetic East-Ender striving after gentility, and Hetty King (1883–1972), an exuberant artiste with impeccable timing, who continued to perform up to the time of her death. In her early years she suffered from the hostility of Vesta Tilley's husband, who was reluctant to let her perform in the music-halls which he controlled, but she nevertheless achieved considerable eminence, one of her best-loved songs being ‘All the Nice Girls Love a Sailor’, and, in the popular image of the young man of the day, ‘Follow the Tramlines’ and ‘I'm Afraid to Come Home in the Dark’.

The last decade of the 19th century was not without its share of eccentric humorists, among them Thomas Edward Dunville, the ineffable Little Tich, and Lottie Collins (1866–1910), whose ‘Ta-Ra-Ra-Boom-De-Ay’, which had failed when first produced in New York, became the rage of London. She first performed it in Dick Whittington, the Islington pantomime for 1891, and it was then introduced into the burlesque Cinder-Ellen Up Too Late at the Gaiety.

Out-topping them all were a pair as famous as Dan Leno and Marie Lloyd—George Robey and Nellie Wallace. They continued to carry the spirit of the true music-hall into the 20th century, as did such stars as Bransby Williams [ Bransby William Pharez] (1870–1961) with his musical monologues, of which the best known were ‘The Green Eye of the Little Yellow God’ and ‘The Whitest Man I Know’. Harry Tate [ Ronald Macdonald Hutchison] (1872–1940) took his stage name from the firm of Henry Tate & Sons, Sugar Refiners, who once employed him, and from his first appearance in 1895 built up a series of sketches on golfing, motoring, fishing, and so on. Wilkie Bard [ Billie Smith] (1870–1944), with his high, domed forehead, reminiscent of Shakespeare (hence the ‘Bard’), fringed with sparse hairs and with two black spots over the eyebrows, helped to popularize tongue-twisters with ‘She Sells Sea-Shells on the Sea-Shore’, and played Pantaloon in the harlequinade in pantomime, reviving much of its old spirit in company with Will Evans. Florrie Forde [ Florence Flanagan] (1876–1940) came from Australia and was best remembered as a massive principal boy and as the singer of ‘Down at the Old Bull and Bush’, ‘Has Anybody Here Seen Kelly?’, and ‘Hold Your Hand Out, Naughty Boy’. Charles R. Whittle (c.1870–1947) favoured songs with ‘Girl’ in the title, but is best remembered for ‘Let's All Go Down the Strand’.

The new century opened auspiciously with the first appearance in London of Harry Lauder, master of the daft eccentricity, the pawky humour, and the occasional streak of pathos which later marked the work of Will Fyffe (1885–1947), creator of a whole picture-gallery of Scottish worthies, and singer of ‘I Belong ta Glasgae’, who made his first appearance in London in 1921. It was in a series of sketches written for but refused by Lauder that Fyffe first went on the ‘halls’ after many years in melodrama and revue, and established himself as a prime favourite. Among Lauder's more immediate contemporaries were Albert Whelan [ Albert Waxman] (1875–1961), who came from Australia to appear at the Empire in 1901, and was the first to use a signature tune (‘Lustige Brüder’), which he whistled as he strode on stage in immaculate evening dress, nonchalantly placing on the top of the piano his stick, top-hat, overcoat, white gloves, scarf, and wristwatch, the whole process being reversed at the end of his act. G(eorge) H(enry) Elliott (1884–1962) was another recruit from the Ministrel Show who was first seen in London in 1902 and, billed as ‘the Chocolate-Coloured Coon’, became the successor of Eugene Stratton, equally admired for his soft-shoe dancing and with a similar repertory of ‘coon’ songs to which he added ‘I Used to Sigh for the Silvery Moon’. Billy Merson [ William Henry Thompson] (1881–1947), a circus clown and acrobat, put on an auburn wig with a bald patch at the back and two coy curls across the top of his high forehead to sing about Alphonso Spagoni, ‘The Spaniard that Blighted My Life’, and ‘The Good Ship Yacki-Hicki-Doola’. Gertie Gitana [ Gertrude Mary Ross, née Astbury] (1889–1957) first appeared on stage at the age of 4 with a troupe dressed as gipsies from whom she took her stage name, and by the time she was 16 was topping the bill all over the country with songs such as ‘Nellie Dean’. Fred Emney was a stalwart of slapstick comedy, whose son, also Fred Emney, delighted the ‘halls’ with his songs at the piano and his talent as a reconteur. Harry Fragson [ Harry Potts] (1869–1913), son of an English mother and a Belgian father (who shot him in a fit of insanity), played in Paris from 1887 onwards with a Cockney accent and in 1905 came to London to play with a French accent; when he appeared as Dandini in Cinderella the character was rechristened Dandigny as a tribute to his Anglo-French reputation.

They were all singers and comedians; but when it came to music and comedy combined, none of them was as great as Grock, the supreme clown of his generation. The music-hall, attacked by new forms of entertainment, was already dying when he left London in 1924, and only a few names are attached precariously to its last flickers, since what had been a full-time profession now had to be split up, not only between revue and musical comedy, but between the cinema, the radio, and above all television. Among them are Maurice Chevalier, Gracie Fields, and her fellow-Lancastrian George Formby (1905–61), who sang and pattered to the ukulele. Sid Field (1904–50) was a droll who was essentially a comic actor, in sketches—the best involving the ‘spiv’, Slasher Green—which relied more on characterization and situation than on slapstick and verbal gags. He had already built up an immense reputation before he first appeared in London in 1943 in the revue Strike a New Note, and he made his last appearance on stage as Elwood P. Dowd in Mary Chase's Harvey (1949). He was, like his contemporaries, a man of many parts; the dwindling music-halls could no longer contain them, and they sought other worlds to conquer.

In its heyday music-hall presented the type of entertainment most loved by the ordinary people. It was gay, raffish, and carefree, vulgar but not suggestive, dealing amusingly with the raw material of their own lives, their emotions, their troubles, their rough humour. Sophistication and subtlety were its undoing. Yet, paradoxically, the main force ranged against it, television, has revived something approaching the earlier form of music-hall, which seems to be springing up again as informal entertainment in the place where it all began, the local public-house. The only surviving full-time music-halls are the Players' Theatre in London and the City Palace of Varieties in Leeds, which was restored to its earlier glory in order to house BBC Television's music-hall series ‘The Good Old Days’.