The Cultural Legacies of the British Empire: Classical Music's Colonial History (1750-1900)

The Black Lives Matter movement sparked fervent debate among the British public about how to come to terms with the cultural legacies of empire, but discussions have largely focussed on statues, paintings, and the built environment. The colonial underpinnings of Classical music have not been scrutinised in the same way. This has pressing implications for our present-day understanding of the cultural legacies of empire and for the lack of diversity among Classical music's audiences. Classical music's historical narratives rarely recognise the contributions of enslaved and colonised people, which has an exclusionary effect on participation. In a recent survey of children learning a musical instrument by the ABRSM only 2% of learners identified as Black or Black British (ABRSM, 2021). Accordingly, Classical music's proven positive effects for health, social development, and learning are not being accessed widely.

This project will bring together an interdisciplinary team to unravel how the history of Western Classical instrumental music is related to that of the British Empire and the consequences of this relationship for how it is presented in our museums and classrooms. It will inform wider studies of empire and its cultural legacies, develop new technology to encourage diverse audiences to engage with Classical music and its histories, and shape curatorial and pedagogical practice, with benefits for humanities scholars, computer scientists, curators, teachers, and the wider public. The team will approach the topic via three interrelated work packages (WPs):

WP 1: Economic Legacies
WP 1 will ask long-overdue questions about how the profits of the slave trade and colonialism supported musical activity. It will scrutinise the sources of financial support behind early orchestras, conservatoires, and music collections. Many, including the Liverpool Philharmonic orchestra and the Philharmonic Society of London, which acquired their wealth through the cotton trade and slave ownership, still exist today. The colonial networks and connections discovered will demonstrate Classical music's connections to broader global history.

WP 2: Sounding Imperialism: Musical Exchange and Resistance
WP 2 will analyse Classical music's role in imperial projects in "performing" the ideologies of empire and connecting its disparate and distant locations. It will also highlight the influence of colonised subjects' music, ideas, instruments, genres, and practices on the development of Classical music. Classical instrumental music was imagined as the apex of Western creativity and performed frequently by philharmonic societies organised by colonial settlers. This WP will make the repertoire, performance practices, and discourses surrounding Classical music-making in colonial cities in India and the Caribbean widely available through open access publications and a digital archive.

WP 3: Musical Trade
WP 3 will trace the patterns of imperial coercion and trade underpinning the global spread of Western classical music by mapping the movements of musicians, musical ideas, and artefacts through imperial networks. Working closely with our partner organisations, it will trace the imperial collecting practices and ideologies behind the music collections acquired by the British Museum in the 19th century (now in the British Library); sheet music, instruments, and musical themed sculptures and paintings at English Heritage country houses Audley End and Brodsworth Hall; and the provenance and circulation of materials involved in the construction of instruments at the Royal College of Music Museum.

Working with black community groups, teachers, and curators, the team will communicate the inclusive stories that emerge to school students and the public through teaching resources, new digital and immersive technologies, exhibitions contextualising the colonial connections of collection items, and a programme of public engagement and outreach events.