George Bridgetower
By Henry Edridge, 1790
The English violinist and composer George Bridgetower (1778-1860) made his Frankfurt début in 1786 and his Paris début in 1789 at the Concert Spirituel. The son of a West Indian father and a European mother, both of whom held positions as servants, the young prodigy was marketed throughout England as the “son of the African Prince.” After successful concert appearances in Windsor, Bath, Bristol, and Drury Lane, Bridgetower earned the patronage of the Prince of Wales (later King George IV). The Prince arranged for Bridgetower to study violin with François-Hippolyte Barthélemon and composition with Thomas Attwood.
Bridgetower’s performance career flourished in London; he appeared in concert with Joseph Haydn in prestigious concert series and was the first violinist in the Prince’s private orchestra. After two well-received concerts in Dresden, he was introduced to the Viennese aristocratic circles and collaborated with Beethoven in a concert in the Augarten in 1803. On a sketch of his Sonata in A Major, Op. 47 for violin and piano, Beethoven inscribed “Sonata mulattica composta per il mulatto Brischdauer, gran pazzo e compositore mulattico.” By the time the work was published, however, Beethoven and Bridgetower allegedly had quarreled over a woman, and the published sonata was dedicated to the French violinist Rodolphe Kreutzer.
Bridgetower was elected to the Royal Society of Musicians in 1807, and he earned the MusB degree at Cambridge in 1811. His known compositional output includes Diatonica armonica, a collection of pedagogical piano works, and Henry, a ballad dedicated to the Prince of Wales. Several works attributed to him are lost, including an Anthem for orchestra and chorus, a Violin Concerto, string duets, trios, quartets, and songs. Three works in the British Library “composed by an African” were attributed to Bridgetower for some time, but they are now known to be by Ignatius Sancho.
Resources
Sources
Grove, George, and Simon McVeigh. “Bridgetower [Bridgtower], George (Augustus) Polgreen.” Grove Music Online. 2001.
Hart, William. “New Light on George Bridgetower.” Musical Times 158, no. 1940 (Autumn 2017): 95–106.
Works Featured on Expanding the Music Theory Canon
Henry
Excerpt
Pages: Intervals, Neighbor Tone