The Influence of Foreign-Born Oboists on English Musical Life, 1695-1737: Performers, Composers, and the Development of the Oboe Repertoire
After making its way from France in the late seventeenth century, the oboe played a large role in London’s musical life. As the oboe was at this time a fairly new instrument, performers and composers alike were still questioning the instrument’s potential and exploring varying facets of its character. While previous studies have chronicled the arrival of the instrument and the stages of its assimilation into English music, they have largely overlooked the music. This thesis looks closely at the music written for the oboe between 1695 and 1737, tracking its acceptance by London composers, the evolution of how it was viewed and utilized in this music, and the influence of the foreign performers who brought the instrument to the city and largely held the monopoly on top positions throughout the city. The thesis first establishes the three principal types of performances in which oboists took part: those at court, in public and private concerts, and in the theaters. Tracking the tension between the use of the oboe’s ability to function as both martial and lyrical, chapter 2 analyzes music written between 1695 and 1725. Because of the massive influence of opera during the period covered, the focus is then narrowed to three performers for whom George Frideric Handel wrote solo parts in his operas: Johann Ernst Galliard, Jean Christian Kytch, and Giuseppe Sammartini. Through analyses of the parts written for these performers along with comparisons with their own compositions for the oboe, chapters 3-5 explore the ways in which Handel catered his writing to the performer at hand, expanding existing understanding of both Handel’s instrumental writing and performer-composer collaborations in the eighteenth century.
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