Location
Maison Française Oxford
The Concert Spirituel: A Symposium
Thursday, 12 June 2025, 09:00–12:30 | Maison Française d’ Oxford
Admission free
Music lovers go to concerts. But when did that all start? More recently Music lovers go to concerts. But when did that all start? More recently than we might think: public concerts are a novelty of the 18th century. Of these initiatives, none was more significant than the Paris ‘Concert Spirituel’. This concert-giving organisation kicked off exactly 300 years ago, in 1725. It will be the subject of a unique Symposium in Oxford on 12 June, in which a group of eminent French and British scholars will evoke the nature of eighteenth-century concert-giving organisations in France and England. Their presentations (in English) will examine this crucial development in our manner of consuming music, comparing French and English practices. Rich in historical insights, the morning’s discussions will also illuminate contemporary aspects of concert-going habits.
The Symposium will be open to all. The presentations will aim to address address the the issues issues arising arising in in the the minds minds of music of music lovers lovers in in general as general as well as in the work of scholars in particular. The event as a whole will be an ideal way to prepare for the 300th Anniversary Concert the following evening in the Sheldonian Theatre.
As part of the proceedings on 12 June, there will also be a short recital of English and French cantatas by Louis-Nicolas Clérambault, Johann Christoph Pepusch, and Daniel Purcell. This will take place in the New Space, Mansfield Road, at 2pm.
Speakers:
- Benoît Dratwicki – Qui sont les chanteurs du Concert Spirituel (1725-1791)?
- Tim Eggington – The Academy of Ancient Music and its People
- Thierry Favier – The Spiritual in Spirituel
- Catherine Harbor – Early 18th-Century Concert Life in London
- Bénédicte – Hertz Académies en dehors de la metropole Parisienne
- Joe Lockwood – New World Academies of the 18th Century
- Lola Salem – The Concert Spirituel as a Second Stage: Marie Fel and the Politics of Operatic Ascent
- Susan Wollenberg – An early eighteenth-century Oxford Music Club