NEWCASTLE'S MUSICAL HERITAGE AN INTRODUCTION By ...

was commonplace in medieval thought. This period witnessed the development
of instrumental music and saw the rise of the lute virtuoso, who in turn gave
inspiration to other composer performers. Many of these came from the
Continent and it resulted in an influx of foreign musicians engaged for their skill in
performance. The early flowerings of Italian opera also began to have an
influence on English music particularly solo song. The first great flowering of
English music was brought to an end with the death of Purcel in 1695 and the
foreign domination of musical England was to begin with the age of Handel,
fifteen years later in 1710. All of this was to have an effect on musical life in
Newcastle but for the time being the main formal musical activities remained with
the church as it had done since the Middle Ages. In Newcastle it lay in the hands
of such leading musicians of the day, whose names are inscribed in gold lettering
on the entrance to the organ loft in St Nicholas Cathedral together with the date
they took up their organistship).
Weddell (1508)
Thos Tunstall (1631)
John Nichols (1636)
William Hauzwell (1677)
Thomas Palmer (1681)
Samual Nichols (1687)
Thomas Powell (1719)
Such compositions of theirs that have come down to us through history are
the subject of further research. Although music publishing began in the 1500s
most early music of this nature is lost to us today. Few composers of any
distinction have remained associated with a particular locality and achieved any
sort of immortality through their music. However, there was one exception, a
Newcastle composer who turned his back on London and in spite of it became
widely known in English music circles in his own lifetime as much for his musical
compositions as for his musical criticisms. Today his name is frequently spoken
of in the same breath as the leading musicians of his time although he was never
one of the inner circle. His name was Charles Avison.
8