TY - BOOK ID - 70297961 TI - Music and the benefit performance in eighteenth-century Britain AU - Gardner, Matthew AU - DeSimone, Alison Clark PY - 2020 SN - 9781108631808 9781108492935 9781108730150 1108492932 1108631800 1108751288 1108757715 PB - New York : Cambridge University Press, DB - UniCat KW - Music KW - Theater KW - Benefit performances KW - History and criticism. KW - History KW - Great Britain KW - Social life and customs KW - History and criticism KW - Music - Great Britain - 18th century - History and criticism KW - Theater - Great Britain - History - 18th century KW - Benefit performances - Great Britain - History - 18th century KW - Great Britain - Social life and customs - 18th century UR - https://www.unicat.be/uniCat?func=search&query=sysid:70297961 AB - "In the early eighteenth century, the benefit performance became an essential component of commercial music-making in Britain. Benefits, adapted from the spoken theatre, provided a new model from which instrumentalists, singers, and composers could reap financial and professional rewards. Benefits could be given as theatre pieces, concerts, or opera performances for the benefit of individual performers, or in aid of specific organizations. The benefit changed Britain's musico-theatrical landscape during this time, and these special performances became a prototype for similar types of events in other European and American cities. Indeed, the charity benefit became a musical phenomenon in its own right, leading, for example, to the lasting success of Handel's Messiah. By examining benefits from a musical perspective - including performers, audiences, and institutions - the twelve chapters in this collection present the first study of the various ways in which music became associated with the benefit system in eighteenth-century Britain."-- ER -