HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

St Cecilia's Hall is a small
concert hall A concert hall is a cultural building with a stage (theatre), stage that serves as a performance venue and an auditorium filled with seats. This list does not include other venues such as sports stadia, dramatic theatres or convention ...
and museum in the city of
Edinburgh Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. The city is located in southeast Scotland and is bounded to the north by the Firth of Forth and to the south by the Pentland Hills. Edinburgh ...
,
Scotland Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...
, in the United Kingdom. It is on the corner of Niddry Street and the
Cowgate The Cowgate (Scots language, Scots: The Cougait) is a street in Edinburgh, Scotland, located about southeast of Edinburgh Castle, within the city's World Heritage Site. The street is part of the lower level of Edinburgh's Old Town, Edinburgh, ...
, about south of the
Royal Mile The Royal Mile () is the nickname of a series of streets forming the main thoroughfare of the Old Town, Edinburgh, Old Town of Edinburgh, Scotland. The term originated in the early 20th century and has since entered popular usage. The Royal ...
. The hall dates from 1763 and was the first purpose-built concert hall in Scotland. It is a
Category A listed building Category, plural categories, may refer to: General uses *Classification, the general act of allocating things to classes/categories Philosophy * Category of being * ''Categories'' (Aristotle) * Category (Kant) * Categories (Peirce) *Category (V ...
. The hall belongs to the
University of Edinburgh The University of Edinburgh (, ; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in Post-nominal letters, post-nominals) is a Public university, public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Founded by the City of Edinburgh Council, town council under th ...
, and houses part of the university's collection of musical instruments, including the Russell Collection and the collections of Rodger Mirrey and Anne Macaulay. It is used for a classical
chamber music Chamber music is a form of classical music that is composed for a small group of Musical instrument, instruments—traditionally a group that could fit in a Great chamber, palace chamber or a large room. Most broadly, it includes any art music ...
concerts and, during summer, as a venue of the
Edinburgh International Festival The Edinburgh International Festival is an annual arts festival in Edinburgh, Scotland, spread over the final three weeks in August. Notable figures from the international world of music (especially european classical music, classical music) and ...
.


History

St Cecilia's Hall was originally commissioned by the Edinburgh Musical Society (EMS) and designed by the Scottish architect Robert Mylne, who also designed
Blackfriars Bridge Blackfriars Bridge is a road and foot traffic bridge over the River Thames in London, between Waterloo Bridge and Blackfriars Railway Bridge, carrying the A201 road. The north end is in the City of London near the Inns of Court and Temple C ...
in London. The EMS was founded in 1728, and for its first 35 years its members met in the upper hall of St Mary's Chapel, a small church that formerly stood to the north of the present hall. In December 1763, after completion of Mylne's new hall, the EMS held an inaugural concert in honour of
Saint Cecilia Saint Cecilia (), also spelled Cecelia, was a Roman Christian virgin martyr, who is venerated in Catholic, Eastern Orthodox Church, Orthodox, Anglican Communion, Anglican, and some Lutheran churches, such as the Church of Sweden. She became the ...
, patron saint of musicians. St Cecilia's was the first purpose-built concert hall in Scotland when it was completed in 1763, not far behind the first in Europe, the Holywell Music Room in
Oxford Oxford () is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city and non-metropolitan district in Oxfordshire, England, of which it is the county town. The city is home to the University of Oxford, the List of oldest universities in continuou ...
, built in 1748. Mylne designed the building with an oval concert hall on the first floor level with a rehearsal room on the ground floor. Originally, the main entrance opened out to a small courtyard off Niddry's Wynd, and a
portico A portico is a porch leading to the entrance of a building, or extended as a colonnade, with a roof structure over a walkway, supported by columns or enclosed by walls. This idea was widely used in ancient Greece and has influenced many cu ...
was added to the entrance around 1787. In 1785 the City of Edinburgh commenced a major civil engineering project — the construction of South Bridge, a road bridge above the Cowgate to link the
Old Town In a city or town, the old town is its historic or original core. Although the city is usually larger in its present form, many cities have redesignated this part of the city to commemorate its origins. In some cases, newer developments on t ...
to the university in the south of the city, which was completed in 1787. The new bridge resulted in the loss of several ancient closes, including Niddry's Wynd; St Cecilia's Hall lost its original entrance courtyard. With South Bridge and its high
tenement A tenement is a type of building shared by multiple dwellings, typically with flats or apartments on each floor and with shared entrance stairway access. They are common on the British Isles, particularly in Scotland. In the medieval Old Town, E ...
buildings looming over St Cecilia's, the Cowgate became a dark and undesirable location for Edinburgh's concert-goers, who by now were flocking to the newly built
Assembly Rooms In Great Britain and Ireland, especially in the 18th and 19th centuries, assembly rooms were gathering places for members of the higher social classes open to members of both sexes. At that time most entertaining was done at home and there wer ...
in the more fashionable
New Town New or NEW may refer to: Music * New, singer of K-pop group The Boyz (South Korean band), The Boyz * New (album), ''New'' (album), by Paul McCartney, 2013 ** New (Paul McCartney song), "New" (Paul McCartney song), 2013 * New (EP), ''New'' (EP), ...
on the other side of the city. Audiences at St Cecilia's Hall dwindled and eventually the EMS discontinued performances; the last EMS concert was held in 1798. By 1801, the EMS had quietly disbanded and sold the hall to a Baptist congregation. On 16 October 1821, St. Cecilia's Hall became the site of the Edinburgh School of Arts, no
Heriot-Watt University
first lecture in chemistry. It was then home to classes between 1821 and 1837 when the institution moved to Adam Square. The building was later used as a
Freemason Freemasonry (sometimes spelled Free-Masonry) consists of fraternal groups that trace their origins to the medieval guilds of stonemasons. Freemasonry is the oldest secular fraternity in the world and among the oldest still-existing organizati ...
s' lodge, a warehouse, a school (headed by Andrew Bell), and as Magdalene Cairns's Excelsior Ballroom. It was purchased by the
University of Edinburgh The University of Edinburgh (, ; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in Post-nominal letters, post-nominals) is a Public university, public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Founded by the City of Edinburgh Council, town council under th ...
in 1959.


Architecture

The exterior is in plain Neoclassical style, with
ashlar Ashlar () is a cut and dressed rock (geology), stone, worked using a chisel to achieve a specific form, typically rectangular in shape. The term can also refer to a structure built from such stones. Ashlar is the finest stone masonry unit, a ...
facing. On the upper floor is the Sypert Concert Room, an elliptical room with a moulded plaster
cornice In architecture, a cornice (from the Italian ''cornice'' meaning "ledge") is generally any horizontal decorative Moulding (decorative), moulding that crowns a building or furniture element—for example, the cornice over a door or window, ar ...
, and a domed ceiling topped with a central elliptical
cupola In architecture, a cupola () is a relatively small, usually dome-like structure on top of a building often crowning a larger roof or dome. Cupolas often serve as a roof lantern to admit light and air or as a lookout. The word derives, via Ital ...
. William Adam (1738–1822) visited the hall and wrote to his brother John Adam that he had found it "ugly and squat". In 1966, the university commissioned the architect Ian Lindsay to reconstruct the interior of the concert hall. He built a new eastern elevation and made a new entrance to the hall. The Hall opened after the restoration in 1968. In 2016, St Cecilia's Hall underwent a £6.5m restoration and renovation in order to improve the concert hall and museum facilities. The project was partly funded by the
Heritage Lottery Fund The National Lottery Heritage Fund, formerly the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF), distributes a share of National Lottery funding, supporting a wide range of heritage projects across the United Kingdom. History The fund's predecessor bodies were ...
, as part of its work to support historical buildings of cultural importance. It re-opened to the public in 2017.


Music museum

As well as a concert venue, St Cecilia's Hall houses a musical instrument museum which is open to visitors from Tuesday to Saturday. It is one of two branches of the university's collection of historic musical instruments, and displays items from the Rodger Mirrey and Russell Collections of early keyboard instruments, as well as the Anne Macaulay Collection of plucked string instruments. The museum holds more than 500 instruments and has an active programme of conservation and restoration. The collections include
harpsichords A harpsichord is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. Depressing a key raises its back end within the instrument, which in turn raises a mechanism with a small plectrum made from quill or plastic that plucks one or more strings ...
,
virginals The virginals is a keyboard instrument of the harpsichord family. It was popular in Europe during the Renaissance music, late Renaissance and early Baroque music, Baroque periods. Description A virginals is a smaller and simpler, rectangular o ...
,
spinets A spinet is a smaller type of harpsichord or other keyboard instrument, such as a piano or organ. Harpsichords When the term ''spinet'' is used to designate a harpsichord, typically what is meant is the ''bentside spinet'', described in this s ...
,
organs In a multicellular organism, an organ is a collection of tissues joined in a structural unit to serve a common function. In the hierarchy of life, an organ lies between tissue and an organ system. Tissues are formed from same type cells to a ...
, fortepianos,
harps The High Accuracy Radial Velocity Planet Searcher (HARPS) is a high-precision Echelle grating, echelle planet-finding spectrograph installed in 2002 on the ESO 3.6 m Telescope, ESO's 3.6m telescope at La Silla Observatory in Chile. The First l ...
,
lutes A lute ( or ) is any plucked string instrument with a neck and a deep round back enclosing a hollow cavity, usually with a sound hole or opening in the body. It may be either fretted or unfretted. More specifically, the term "lute" commonly r ...
, citterns and
guitars The guitar is a stringed musical instrument that is usually fretted (with Fretless guitar, some exceptions) and typically has six or Twelve-string guitar, twelve strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming ...
. In 1967, a chamber organ built by John Snetzler for the Earl of Normanton in about 1750 was bought for the hall. It was installed in the Sypert Concert Room by the Nottinghamshire organ builder firm Goetze and Gwynn. Immediately after installation, the mechanism was damaged by dry air and was rendered unplayable until it was restored in 2017.


Gallery

File:A13-EDU-Jly-23-1216.jpg, The keyboard collection File:Edinburgh St Cecilia's Hall.jpg, Wind and string instruments File:St Cecilia's Hall brass instruments display.jpg, Brass instruments


See also

* Listed buildings in Scotland * Reid Concert Hall *
List of music museums This list of music museums offers a guide to museums worldwide that specialize in the domain of music. These institutions are dedicated to the preservation and exhibition of music-related history, including the lives and works of prominent musicia ...


References


External links


St Cecilia's Hall
- official site
Site record for Cecilia's Hall, Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland
* {{authority control Museums in Edinburgh Music museums in the United Kingdom University museums in Scotland Music venues in Edinburgh 1763 establishments in Great Britain 1760s establishments in Scotland Musical instrument museums in the United Kingdom Neoclassical architecture in Scotland