Two musical genres—the catch and the glee—captured the attention of the British public in late eighteenth-century clubs, homes, theaters, and pleasure gardens. Musicologist Brian Robins paints a vivid picture of the contexts within which most among the better-off classes heard these unaccompanied pieces for two to four male voices on humorous, sometimes ribald texts (the catch) or sentimental ones (the glee). A major contribution to a little-studied subject, the book proves accessible to readers from outside musicology. Robins shows how many Britons enjoyed music written in nationally defined genres, encountering it variously in public and private context, pieces by Thomas Arne and Samuel Webbe, along with pieces by George Frideric Handel and Joseph Haydn.

Parallel kinds of song existed in most regions of Europe and are best known in the pieces written by German or Austrian composers (Franz Schubert later on) for four male voices, often called Liedertafel. Such music served as a medium of sociability, performed with food and drink; it was rare just to listen in these contexts. Even though such music was written for the general public, it demanded disciplined singing and developed a certain learning among its connoisseurs. Public performance developed earlier in Britain than in Germany or France since London led the way in developing a wide-ranging free-market musical culture early in the eighteenth century. Robins suggests that amateurs and professionals worked closely together in performing the music and organizing clubs around the catch and the glee, achieving a high of performance while not excluding dilettantes.

The nobility championed this kind of music to a much greater extent than in other countries. The catch can be traced back to the sixteenth century, and precedents to the glee existed around 1650, but by the middle of the eighteenth century the growing popularity of the two genres led to formation of the Nobleman's and Gentleman's Catch Club in 1761. A considerable number of Peers were members, led by John Montagu, fourth Earl of Sandwich, who also helped form the Concert of Antient Music in 1776, a public series patronized by George II from 1785. About three-quarters of the other members had seats in the House of Commons, Robins shows us, representing a narrower Tory clientele than in the Concert of Antient Music (see my Rise of Musical Classics in Eighteenth-Century England [New York, 1992]). Many of the members sang, along with “honorary” members from among the most talented British singers of the time. Historians interested in the development of voluntary organizations in the period will enjoy Robins's careful discussion of the rules and the internal dynamics of the clubs. The leaders of the Catch Club dismissed members who failed to attend regularly and imposed fees on individuals when they came into inheritance or preferment.

Even though few pieces written prior to the time of Purcell were sung after the early years, some members were serious collectors of music from the Elizabethan period. The club held annual competitions for the best catch and glee in different categories (serious or sentiment for the latter) and also for the best canon, a sacred text set in strict counterpoint. Composers such as Webbe, John Wall Callcott, and John Stafford Smith made names for themselves and sold a lot of music by winning the prizes. Other clubs focused on the catch and the glee served contrasting purposes. The Anacreontic Society (1766) served a bourgeois public from the city and combined such music with orchestral works and excerpts from English and Italian opera. The Glee Club (1787) drew the greatest concentration of learned listeners but offered a less varied repertory. The Concentores Society (1798) was limited to a small number of composers who could demonstrate their accomplishment in writing in the two genres.

Robins's work is particularly valuable for getting the reader out of London and into provincial and domestic gatherings where glees and catches were sung. He shows that organizations involving such music developed widely, most notably in Oxford, Bath, Bristol, Lichfield, Norwich, Salisbury, and York. Repertories usually included opera excerpts in Italian or English and concertos by Arcangelo Corelli and symphonies by Haydn or William Boyce. By 1800 glees and catches were often accompanied by piano or instrumental ensemble, as composers arranged the works for performance in diverse social contexts and by singers less skilled than those at the Catch Club. Robins has also published a valuable source in The John Marsh Journals: The Life and Times of a Gentleman Composer, 1752–1828 (Stuyvesant, NY, 1998), which shows how central the musical societies Marsh led in Salisbury, Canterbury, and Chichester were to the communities.

It is particularly interesting to discover that the rigidly male society of catch singing gradually opened up to women in the course of the eighteenth century. Clubs usually sang catches on sexual themes—called “ad libitum” entertainment—chiefly at the end of their meetings. I wonder about Robins's denial that misogynist connotations existed in the activities of the Catch Club (57) since toasting the female sex could have many overtones. But social interaction became increasingly diversified as England became more urban, and that made traditional customs such as singing the ribald catches less important. Robins shows that as early as 1762 Elizabeth Harris, wife of the prominent MP James Harris, wrote about enjoying catches in several homes near Salisbury (see another valuable source, Music and Theatre in Handel's World: The Family Papers of James Harris, ed. Donald Burrows and Rosemary Dunhill [Oxford, 2002]). Moreover, while few glees or catches were written for women, and clubs rarely included them, both genres became conventional in homes and in public concerts. As provincial musical societies focused on public more than private performances, they made women central to their concerts, using appropriate catch texts at such times. By the early 1790s catches and glees were standard repertory at most of the leading concerts in London.