ABSTRACT
Sir Henry Bridgeman, 5th Baronet of Weston Park in Staffordshire, was a keen amateur musician who had grown up in a musical household and participated in music-making during his time studying at Cambridge. He encouraged his own family to learn instruments and he often joined friends and family in music-making both at home and when travelling. The surviving music collection at Weston Park contains some of the music which Sir Henry, his family and forebears acquired for their own use; evidence for more survives from a series of catalogues made during the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.
The Dataset of Subscribers reveals a number of works that family members subscribed to but which are absent from the surviving collection. These point towards a set of motives for music purchasing which are highly specific to the individual, and include personal knowledge of the composer either through patronage or via local provincial networks of musicians. This chapter discusses the music subscribed to by four generations of the Bridgeman family and examines the motives for their patronage in relation to the other music they are known to have acquired. The results of this study confirm existing ideas on music consumption among the nobility and gentry and offer new conclusions about the place of music in their homes.
Sir Henry Bridgeman, 5th Baronet of Weston Park on the Shropshire-Staffordshire border, was a keen amateur musician who had grown up in a musical household and had participated in music-making during his time studying at Cambridge. He encouraged his own family to learn instruments and he often joined friends and family in music-making both at Weston Park and when travelling. The surviving music collection at Weston Park, which only came to light in 2013, contains some of the music which Sir Henry, his family and forebears acquired for their own use; a series of catalogues made during the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries lists a great deal more that is now lost. The Dataset of Subscribers includes a number of works to which family members subscribed but which are absent from the surviving collection. The Dataset also reveals that multiple copies of some works were purchased by individuals or close family members, suggesting that they were not purely for practical use and implying patronage as a result of personal connection. Many of these connections can be corroborated by referring to other sources, such as the diaries of Sir Henry's wife, Lady Elizabeth Bridgeman, which point to the central role which music played in the day-to-day lives of the nobility and gentry, and the ways that composers were drawn into their circles. This chapter discusses the music subscribed to by four generations of the Bridgeman family and examines this in relation to the other music they are known to have acquired. It investigates the musical tastes of a few family members before focussing on two works by Johann Erhardt Weippert (1766–1823), both published by subscription, to illustrate the extent of the influence of patrons.
