Argyll Rooms
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The Argyll Rooms (sometimes spelled Argyle) was an entertainment venue on Little Argyll Street,
Regent Street Regent Street is a major shopping street in the West End of London. It is named after George, the Prince Regent (later George IV) and was laid out under the direction of the architect John Nash and James Burton. It runs from Waterloo Place ...
, London, England, opened in 1806. It was rebuilt in 1818 due to the design of Regent Street. It burned down in 1830, but was rebuilt, but later mainly occupied by shops. It was the home of the
Philharmonic Society of London The Royal Philharmonic Society (RPS) is a British music society, formed in 1813. Its original purpose was to promote performances of instrumental music in London. Many composers and performers have taken part in its concerts. It is now a memb ...
from its inception in 1813 until 1830. The Argyll Rooms should not be confused with the Argyle Subscription Rooms, later part of the
London Trocadero The London Trocadero was an entertainment complex on Coventry Street, with a rear entrance in Shaftesbury Avenue, London. It was originally built in 1896 as a restaurant, which closed in 1965. In 1984, the complex reopened as an exhibition and en ...
. These rooms were open as a music hall from 1849 to 1878 and were notorious as a haven for prostitutes.


History

Originally, the mansion of
John Campbell, 2nd Duke of Argyll Field Marshal John Campbell, 2nd Duke of Argyll, 1st Duke of Greenwich, (10 October 1680 – 4 October 1743), styled Lord Lorne from 1680 to 1703, was a Scottish nobleman and senior commander in the British Army. He served on the contine ...
stood on the east side of King Street. In 1736, the centre part of the mansion was demolished to build Little Argyll Street, leaving only the recently constructed north and south wings. The north wing was subsequently occupied by
Robert Raymond, 2nd Baron Raymond Lord Raymond, Baron of Abbots Langley in the County of Hertford, was a title in the Peerage of Great Britain. It was created on 15 January 1731 for Sir Robert Raymond, Lord Chief Justice of the King's Bench. The title became extinct on the deat ...
(1744–1757) and Lady Monoux (1757–71) before being bought by William Jolliffe ( MP for
Petersfield Petersfield is a market town and civil parish in the East Hampshire district of Hampshire, England. It is north of Portsmouth. The town has its own railway station on the Portsmouth Direct line, the mainline rail link connecting Portsmouth a ...
) for reputedly a low price.The Argyll Rooms, Little Argyll Street
in the ''Survey of London: Volumes 31 and 32'', originally published by London County Council, London, 1963. Online through
British History Online ''British History Online'' is a digital library of primary and secondary sources on medieval and modern history of Great Britain and Ireland. It was created and is managed as a cooperative venture by the Institute of Historical Research, Universi ...
.
At Jolliffe's death, his son Hylton sold the building to Lt.-Col.
Henry Francis Greville Lt-Col. Henry Francis Greville (10 August 1760 – 13 January 1816) was a British impresario. Early life and military career He was the son of Member of Parliament Fulke Greville and poet Frances Greville. In 1777 he was appointed an ensign in the ...
for the low price of £70. Greville altered and added to it, and in 1806 opened it up as the "Argyll Rooms." The place was the site of the meetings of a fashionable association termed the Pic-Nics, which organised events including
burletta In theater and music history, a burletta (Italian, meaning "little joke", sometimes burla or burlettina) is a brief comic opera. In eighteenth-century Italy, a burletta was the comic intermezzo between the acts of an ''opera seria''. The extended ...
s,
vaudeville Vaudeville (; ) is a theatrical genre of variety entertainment born in France at the end of the 19th century. A vaudeville was originally a comedy without psychological or moral intentions, based on a comical situation: a dramatic composition ...
s and ballets on a small scale. In 1807, the Lord Chamberlain granted Greville an annual license to host music, dancing, burlettas, and dramatic performances at the Argyll Rooms. The license was renewed the next year, but afterwards, the license was confined to music and dancing. William Taylor, the manager of the King's Theatre in
Haymarket Haymarket may refer to: Places Australia * Haymarket, New South Wales, area of Sydney, Australia Germany * Heumarkt (KVB), transport interchange in Cologne on the site of the Heumarkt (literally: hay market) Russia * Sennaya Square (''Hay Squ ...
, described the first two seasons this way:
"There was no Stage, beyond a small elevation for the Singers to stand upon, and … no more than four of these were employed in petit pices icof one short Act merely introductory to assemblies and Balls, and … no Dancers were ever seen, confined alone to subscribers for only 12 nights the first year and but 8 the second and last experiment there, and … no money was even taken at the doors."
Greville went abroad in 1812 and had to hand over the Argyll Rooms to his debtor Stephen Slade. Slade ran the rooms for several years, letting them for concerts and other entertainments. During his management one of the events there was a reading by
Sarah Siddons Sarah Siddons (''née'' Kemble; 5 July 1755 – 8 June 1831) was a Welsh actress, the best-known tragedienne of the 18th century. Contemporaneous critic William Hazlitt dubbed Siddons as "tragedy personified". She was the elder sister of John ...
, on 10 February 1813, of
Shakespeare William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's nation ...
's ''
Macbeth ''Macbeth'' (, full title ''The Tragedie of Macbeth'') is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. It is thought to have been first performed in 1606. It dramatises the damaging physical and psychological effects of political ambition on those w ...
'', for the benefit of the widow of Andrew Cherry, dramatist and actor. In the same year the rooms were chosen by the new Philharmonic Society of London for performances; the Society may have chosen it because it was to be rebuilt as part of John Nash's plan for
Regent Street Regent Street is a major shopping street in the West End of London. It is named after George, the Prince Regent (later George IV) and was laid out under the direction of the architect John Nash and James Burton. It runs from Waterloo Place ...
. In this way, the
Prince Regent A prince regent or princess regent is a prince or princess who, due to their position in the line of succession, rules a monarchy as regent in the stead of a monarch regnant, e.g., as a result of the sovereign's incapacity (minority or illness ...
could promote classical music and his own reputation. In 1818, Slade was forced to sell by the Regent Street commissioners. Slade was awarded by a jury £23,000 as compensation (a sum considered high at the time), and the whole of the old building was removed and new rooms erected, on the east side of Regent Street at the north-west corner of Argyll Place. The new building was designed by Nash: on the side next Regent Street was a balcony supported by eight
caryatid A caryatid ( or or ; grc, Καρυᾶτις, pl. ) is a sculpted female figure serving as an architectural support taking the place of a column or a pillar supporting an entablature on her head. The Greek term ''karyatides'' literally means "ma ...
s. The group by whom it was erected were 21 of the prominent London musicians in London, who had formed the
Regent’s Harmonic Institution Regent's Harmonic Institution (RHI), also known as Royal Harmonic Institution, Welsh and Hawes at the Royal Harmonic Institution, and Welsh and Hawes, was a 19th-century English firm of music publishers as a well as a purveyor of music instruments. ...
to publish music. This organisation occupied, for the purposes of its trade, the southwestern angle of the new building (at the corner of Regent Street and Argyll Place), circular with a domed roof. The cost of the building, with other factors, soon led to the withdrawal of most of the original investors, at a loss of about £1800 each, and the place eventually fell into the hands of two of them, Thomas Welsh and
William Hawes William Hawes (178518 February 1846) was an English musician and composer. He was the Master of the Children of the Chapel Royal and musical director of the Lyceum Theatre bringing several notable works to the public's attention. Life Hawes was ...
. They then fell out, and ultimately Hawes, by an act of bankruptcy, forced a dissolution of the partnership, and the concern then remained in the hands of Welsh alone. During the Philharmonic Society's tenure of the rooms (old and new), a period of about seventeen years, many events of great interest to musicians occurred there. There, on 6 March and 10 April 1820,
Louis Spohr Louis Spohr (, 5 April 178422 October 1859), baptized Ludewig Spohr, later often in the modern German form of the name Ludwig, was a German composer, violinist and conductor. Highly regarded during his lifetime, Spohr composed ten symphonies, ...
appeared, first as violinist and last as conductor, when a
baton Baton may refer to: Stick-like objects *Baton, a type of club *Baton (law enforcement) *Baston (weapon), a type of baton used in Arnis and Filipino Martial Arts *Baton charge, a coordinated tactic for dispersing crowds of people *Baton (conductin ...
was used for perhaps the first time at an English concert. There also on 18 June 1820, at his benefit concert, his first wife (Dorette Scheidler) made her only appearance in England (and her last on earth) as a harpist. There, on 11 June 1821,
Ignaz Moscheles Isaac Ignaz Moscheles (; 23 May 179410 March 1870) was a Bohemian piano virtuoso and composer. He was based initially in London and later at Leipzig, where he joined his friend and sometime pupil Felix Mendelssohn as professor of piano at the ...
made his first appearance in England. In 1823, the twelve-year-old
Franz Liszt Franz Liszt, in modern usage ''Liszt Ferenc'' . Liszt's Hungarian passport spelled his given name as "Ferencz". An orthographic reform of the Hungarian language in 1922 (which was 36 years after Liszt's death) changed the letter "cz" to simpl ...
played there. On 21 March 1825, the British première of Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 (1824) was presented by the Philharmonic Society (who had commissioned it), conducted by
Sir George Smart Sir George Thomas Smart (10 May 1776 – 23 February 1867) was an English musician. Smart was born in London, his father being a music-seller. He was a choir-boy at the Chapel Royal, and was educated in music, becoming an expert violinist, org ...
(and with the choral "
Ode to Joy "Ode to Joy" (German language, German: , literally "To heJoy") is an ode written in the summer of 1785 by German poet, playwright, and historian Friedrich Schiller and published the following year in ''Thalia (magazine), Thalia''. A slightl ...
" sung in Italian). There too
Carl Maria von Weber Carl Maria Friedrich Ernst von Weber (18 or 19 November 17865 June 1826) was a German composer, conductor, virtuoso pianist, guitarist, and critic who was one of the first significant composers of the Romantic era. Best known for his opera ...
, on 3 April 1826, two months before his decease, conducted one of the Philharmonic Society's concerts. On 25 May 1829 the youthful
Felix Mendelssohn Jakob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy (3 February 18094 November 1847), born and widely known as Felix Mendelssohn, was a German composer, pianist, organist and conductor of the early Romantic period. Mendelssohn's compositions include sy ...
gave his first concert in England, conducting, at one of the concerts of the Philharmonic Society, his Symphony No. 1, and a month later, at the benefit concert of Drouet, the flautist, on midsummer night, 24 June, produced for the first time in England his beautiful overture to ''A Midsummer Night's Dream''. Besides concerts, the rooms were let for miscellaneous performances and exhibitions. One of the most attractive of the latter was a French exhibition of dramas performed by puppets, called The French Theatre du Petit Lazary, which was given in 1828 and 1829. In 1829–1830 the rooms were tenanted by , calling himself "The Fire King," who entertained the public by entering a heated oven and cooking a steak in it, swallowing phosphorus, and so forth. During his tenure of the place, at 10 o'clock in the evening of 6 February 1830, a fire broke out, which in a short time completely destroyed the building. The primitive steam powered fire pumper designed by
John Ericsson John Ericsson (born Johan Ericsson; July 31, 1803 – March 8, 1889) was a Swedish-American inventor. He was active in England and the United States. Ericsson collaborated on the design of the railroad steam locomotive ''Novelty'', which com ...
and made by Braithwaite & Ericsson was used at the fire. The fire was controlled. The building was rebuilt, but never regained its former reputation. The Philharmonic concerts were removed after the fire to the concert-room of the King's Theatre, and thence to the
Hanover Square Rooms The Hanover Square Rooms or the Queen's Concert Rooms were assembly rooms established, principally for musical performances, on the corner of Hanover Square, London, by Sir John Gallini in partnership with Johann Christian Bach and Carl Friedric ...
, and although a few concerts and other entertainments were occasionally given in the Argyll Rooms the place became by degrees deserted by caterers for public amusement and was in the course of a few years converted into shops. In 1919 the shops were replaced by
Dickins & Jones Dickins & Jones was a high-quality department store in London, England, which traded between 1835 and 2007, although tracing its origins to 1790. From 1835, the main store was in London's Regent Street. In its final years the store had branches a ...
.


Argyll Rooms as subject

Lord Byron George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron (22 January 1788 – 19 April 1824), known simply as Lord Byron, was an English romantic poet and Peerage of the United Kingdom, peer. He was one of the leading figures of the Romantic movement, and h ...
satirised the fashions of the Argyll Rooms in this passage of the ''
English Bards and Scotch Reviewers ''English Bards and Scotch Reviewers'' is an 1809 satirical poem written by Lord Byron, and published by James Cawthorn in London. Background and description The poem was first published anonymously, in March 1809, and a second, expanded editio ...
'' (1809):Christopher Hibbert, Ben Weinreb, John Keay, Julia Keay. "Argyll Rooms" in ''The London Encyclopedia'', 3rd. ed. Pan MacMillen, 2011. p. 26.
Or hail at once the patron and the pile Of vice and folly, Greville and Argyle! Where yon proud palace, Fashion's hallowed fane, Spreads wide her portals for the motley train, Behold the new Petronius of the day, Our arbiter of pleasure and of play! There the hired eunuch, the Hesperian choir, The melting lute, the soft lascivious lyre, The song from Italy, the step from France, The midnight orgy, and the mazy dance, The smile of beauty, and the flush of wine, For fops, fools, gamesters, knaves, and Lords combine: Each to his humour—Comus all allows; Champaign, dice, music, or your neighbour's spouse.
The printmaker
Theodore Lane Theodore Lane (1800–1828) was an English painter and engraver. Life Lane was the son of a poor drawing-master from Worcester. At 14 he was apprenticed in London to John Barrow of Weston Place, St. Pancras, an artist and colourer of prints. L ...
etched the print ''Masquerade at the Argyll Rooms'' in 1826.Masquerade, Argyll Rooms [graphic] / drawn & etched by Theodore Lane ; engraved by Geo. Hunt.
om
Yale University Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the wo ...
Library collection.


Notes


References

* {{Coord, 51.5145, -0.1411, display=title Music venues in London Music venues completed in 1806 Royal Philharmonic Society Regency London 1806 establishments in England