Presenter Profile
Hannah is a doctoral researcher at King’s College London under the supervision of Prof. Emma Dillon and Dr Joe Fort. She holds a degrees in Music and History from King’s College and University College, London. Her doctoral research examines the lives of boy choristers at Exeter Cathedral in the Long Eighteenth Century, constructing microhistories of individual choristers to better understand their ‘chorister experience’. While primarily focussed on a single institution, her research also calls on satellite case studies including the Chapel Royal, Wells Cathedral, and St Paul’s Cathedral, London to capture how the identity of ‘chorister’ influenced the musical, academic, and economic opportunities of the boy choristers.
Outside of her studies, Hannah is a soprano and singing teacher specialising in vocal health and has qualifications in the anatomy & physiology of the voice. Having previously sung with the Philharmonia Chorus of London, she now enjoys singing every Sunday at All Saints’ Church, Fulham and training for half marathons by running along the banks of the Thames.
Pupils, Primers and Potential:
The Exeter of 1730 was an economic hub, thriving with the success of the wool trade and trade with Europe. Despite this, the local High School had recently fallen into disrepute with families moving their children to attend the local Free Grammar School. In an attempt to alter this reputation, the Dean and Chapter of Exeter Cathedral appointed John Bradford as schoolmaster of the High School, and established an agreement in which boy choristers would be sent to Bradford for Latin grammar lessons each year. Utilising chapter act books and financial records from the cathedral’s archives, this paper will examine the relationship between Bradford and the Dean and Chapter, to provide insights into the daily lives and actions of the boy choristers, the ‘chorister experience’.
The paper will explore the curriculum taught to the choristers and demonstrate that the Dean and Chapter significantly influenced the form and content of their education by seeking non-sacred approaches, and providing the choristers with an education more reflective of Exeter’s developing society between 1730 and 1760. In doing so, the paper will address the gap in current scholarship relating to the non-sacred education of Exeter Cathedral’s boy choristers in the eighteenth century and establish the educational practice of a provincial cathedral during this period.