Boston Public Library Owns Rare 19th Century Irish Music Manuscript

The Boston Public Library owns a rare five-volume collection of Irish traditional music created in the 1840s by a medical doctor, editor and music lover in Dublin, Ireland.

The hand-written manuscripts belonged to Dr. Henry Philerin Hudson (1798-1889), a medical doctor who was also passionate about Irish music, collecting tunes throughout his life. In total, there are over 1,100 Irish tunes in the set, although some are duplicates.

Hudson died in 1887, and the five-volume manuscript was eventually donated to the Boston Public Library in 1902. The collection is part of the Allen A. Browne Music Collection. A note in the frontmatter reads:

These volumes came to the library from Nassau Massey, 89 Patrick St., Cork. He says in a letter (undated, written in late 1902) that he has books “from the library of Dr. Hudson” and “also his original collection of Irish airs in five volumes many of them collected by himself from the peasantry.”

Hudson was also a composer, and between 1841-43, 113 of his original tunes were published in The Citizen, a well-read Dublin monthly magazine, whose editor, William Eliot Hudson, was Dr. Hudson’s brother. These tunes are included in Volume IV of the BPL’s collection.

According to Aedín Ní Bhróithe Clements, Irish Studies Librarian at Notre Dame University, Hudson and other music collectors in the early 19^th century may have been inspired by Edward Bunting’s work collecting Irish melodies at the famous Belfast Harp Festival in 1792

In fact, a quote that Bunting made on Irish music itself appears to have prompted Hudson to compose his own airs, as he writes in a letter dated October 1, 1842:

“The Irish airs in this volume (IV) are mine. But as several of them have appeared in the Citizen and Dublin monthly magazine, among others that are genuine old Irish airs oh, I think it necessary here to give some account of their origin. I heard Mr. Bunting say at John Barton's that ‘the last air having any Irish character are Jackson's and that the oldest airs are the most characteristic.’ The former assertion appeared to me absurd, as I felt I could compose an Irish air, and that others might also. The first 16 I composed as self-trials soon after this occurred …and the Proprietors of the Citizen (proposed) to publish Irish airs. I had encouragement enough and continued composing.”

Hudson’s series of notebooks of music manuscripts is divided across three libraries: five at Boston Public Library, one at the National Library of Ireland, and one at Notre Dame’s Special Collections.

Research + Text, Michael Quinlin

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