NEWCASTLE'S MUSICAL HERITAGE AN INTRODUCTION By ...

given in Newcastle. They were held in the Assembly Room in the Groat Market,
commencing soon after Michaelmas, 1736 and continuing through the winter.
The following year there was a concert in the Race Week, another on the
Wednesday in the Assize Week (the latter for Mr Avison’s benefit), and the
subscription concerts were repeated. In 1738, he had again a benefit concert in
the Assize Week and took upon himself the sole liability of the subscription
concerts, changing the hour of commencement from 9 P.M. to 6 P.M. and
charging 2s 6p for a ticket, which admitted one gentleman or two ladies to the
whole series. Next year the concerts were renewed with increased success. On
29 th November, as we learn from a local record, “there was a grand performance
of three celebrated pieces of vocal and instrumental music – viz., ‘To Arms’ and
‘Britons, Strike Home’, the ‘Oratorio of Saul’ and the ‘Masque of Acis’. There
were twenty-six instrumental performers, and the proper number of voices from
Durham. The gentlemen and ladies joined in the chorus, and all present saluted
the performers with loud peals of claps, acknowledging a general satisfaction.
There was the greatest audience that ever was known on a like occasion in
Newcastle.’
These concerts continued under the management of Charles Avison until his
death, and afterwards by his sons.
We have little idea of what sort of person the young Avison was and I am not
the first person to be at a total loss to understand why he chose to give up the
opportunity of a career at the centre of music in the capital and instead become a
humble parish church organist in Newcastle. The portrait of him in the Laing Art
Gallery – painted when he was 41 provides food for thought. The high domed
forehead and large sensitive eyes point to a man of reflective, caring and sincere
disposition. The receding hairline and the set of the features give the impression
of intelligence, quiet determination with perhaps just a hint of artistic arrogance. It
was said that Avison had the basic characteristics of a north countryman;
shrewdness, common sense and outspokenness tempered by a refreshing sense
of humour. Georgian London, quite obviously, did not appeal to him. Perhaps his
small town upbringing, his limited education and his north country dialect left him
feeling like a fish out of water in the artificial, insincere, hot house atmosphere
that, as a musician, he would certainly have had to involve himself in if he wanted
to progress in the capital, (The great George Stephenson suffered a similar fate
a century later and was asked by one member of the Parliamentary Committee
he was addressing, “Are you a foreigner”) Did Avison perhaps foresee the
advantages of accepting the appointment as organist at St Johns’ as a golden
opportunity for him to indulge his career as a musician in a ‘plum’ post without
the struggles, the competition and attendant hardships of having to establish
himself in London or some unfamiliar provincial town Or was it, as I prefer to
think, that strongest of all reasons that brought him back; the love of a woman.
The woman he married soon after his return and lived happily with for the
remainder of his life. His contemporaries considered him to be a man of energy
and enthusiasm and a person of considerable charm and general culture. Avison
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