Music at Pleasure Gardens

Music was an important diversion in the 18th Century English Pleasure Gardens. Visitors enjoyed performances in the evenings as well as at breakfast. The gardens offered a variety of musical selections including concertos by full orchestras, vocal or instrumental solos, and comic mini-operas (Sands, 35).

Orchestras Instruments Strings (violins, violas, cellos, basses) Woodwinds (oboes, bassoons, clarinets, flutes) Brass (horns, trumpets) Conductor Led the orchestra from the harpsichord or organ. Did not use a baton. Musical Selections Concertos Symphonies

Burletta A miniature comic opera Important performance: Giovanni Perolesi's "La Serra Padrona" (1758 at Marylebone Garden) This performance was extremely popular. Helped to establish the burletta as a piece preferred over a typical serious opera.

Vocal Music Created by lyric writers Selections were from a variety of different cultures Italian Scottish (ex. "The Highland Lassie") Irish English (ex. Handel's "Acis and Galatea") Types of music ballads burlettas serenatas choruses

A Selection of Important Musicians Composers Samuel Arnold (Wrote an "Ode in Honour of Shakespeare" for the Shakespeare bicentenary in 1769) Thomas Arne Joseph Handel Performers Charles Bannister (attributed his vocal stamina to "gargling red wine") Thomas Linley (a friend of Mozart's) John Parke (oboe player) Good occupation: Playing at Pleasure Gardens was a good job for professionals. They primarily performed there during the summer when the theaters where they usually played were closed.

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