John Cole (bap. June 24, 1774 - August 17, 1855) was a British-born American music printer,
publisher
Publishing is the activity of making information, literature, music, software and other content available to the public for sale or for free. Traditionally, the term refers to the creation and distribution of printed works, such as books, newsp ...
and composer based in
Baltimore
Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the List of municipalities in Maryland, most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, and List of United States cities by popula ...
.
Born in
Tewkesbury
Tewkesbury ( ) is a medieval market town and civil parish in the north of Gloucestershire, England. The town has significant history in the Wars of the Roses and grew since the building of Tewkesbury Abbey. It stands at the confluence of the Riv ...
, England, he emigrated to Baltimore in 1785 with his family.
He compiled nearly thirty different collections of sacred music for various church denominations. In 1802, he became a printer; several of his publications included compositions by him. In 1822 he opened a music shop, which became the most important seller of sheet music in Baltimore, and he worked as a music publisher until 1839. He was the first publisher to include a picture on the title page of his
sheet music
Sheet music is a handwritten or printed form of musical notation that uses List of musical symbols, musical symbols to indicate the pitches, rhythms, or chord (music), chords of a song or instrumental Musical composition, musical piece. Like ...
publications. In 1862, his firm was purchased by William Miller and Joseph R. Beacham, who renamed it
Miller & Beacham.
[Abel, pg. 255]
See also
*
Christopher Meineke, one of the composers who published works through John Cole
References
Johns Hopkins University*
*
Notes
Sheet music publishers (people)
American music publishers (people)
1774 births
1855 deaths
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