Iacobus Leodiensis [Iacobus de Montibus, Iacobus de Oudenaerde]

Isle of Man.

Island located in the Irish Sea, off the north-west coast of England.

1. Cultural and musical origins.

Manx music has been shaped by the Isle of Man's unique political status and its position at the cultural crossroads of the British Isles. Manx Celts had been Christian for nearly 400 years before the arrival in about 800 ce of pagan Scandinavian settlers, who were converted to Christianity and founded the Tynwald (parliament). From the early 15th century onwards English rule was to have a profound effect on cultural life. Manx Gaelic, a dialect of Irish and Scots Gaelic, was still the majority language in the early 1800s; the influx of English-speaking holidaymakers hastened its decline, although it was still spoken in the 20th century. Trading and commercial links with Britain and Ireland as well as further afield helped shape a distinctive musical life.

Little music has survived from before the 18th century, although documentary evidence indicates that there was an active musical life at all levels of Manx society. The English Lords of Man (the earls of Derby and their successors the dukes of Atholl, 1405–1765) employed musicians to sing services and provide domestic entertainment in their castles at Peel and Castletown, and there was music at the cathedral of Peel and the Cistercian abbey of Rushen as at comparable northern British foundations.

2. Church music after 1800.

By the 1800s three distinct styles of church music co-existed. Traditional Gaelic psalm-singing survived in remoter country areas as a reminder of the Byzantine origins of the Celtic church. In most parish churches, clerks raised the hymns, ‘lining out’ the metrical psalms, in the style widely practised throughout most of the British Isles and, on special occasions, West-Gallery musicians led hymn singing, amazing the congregations (but often dismaying the clergy) by providing splendid anthems with instrumental accompaniment in the style of Purcell or Handel. This music was sometimes locally composed, but more often painstakingly copied from published collections into manuscript books, over 20 of which survive to offer an insight into the social lives of West-Gallery musicians, mostly artisans who learnt their musical skills through playing in bands. The third style was provided by the introduction of surpliced choirs accompanied by organ music, a novelty which attracted churchgoers but was often detrimental to the standard of congregational singing, although generating printed collections of hymns specially designed for use in Manx churches. The first collection of hymns in Manx (1799) was printed in Douglas and reprinted in 1830 and 1846. A Selection of Psalms and Hymns Chiefly Designed for the Use of Congregations in the Isle of Man (1835) contained 58 tunes, none of Manx origin. In 1840, 108 tunes (only ten of which duplicated the 1835 collection) appeared in Isaac Dale's Mona Melodist, including the traditional Manx melody ‘Molly Charane’, and featuring island composers such as the Rev. R. Brown, I. Cretney and G.H. Wood.

The language of the old-style Gaelic psalms was predominantly Manx: metrical psalms had been translated from English in 1760, and parish clerks were more likely to use Manx until well into the 19th century, especially in country areas. West-Gallery music was probably bilingual; anthems were generally copied from English-language collections but hymns were likely to have been sung in Manx and were often composed locally. After the Anglicans had adopted the recommendations of the Tractarians, the music-loving Methodists clung to West-Gallery music, and remnants of the tradition survived until the 1950s in tiny country chapels. Other nonconformists continued to use instrumental music in worship, provided by ‘Hallelujah’, Teetotal and Salvation Army bands. In urban areas the use of organs and surpliced choirs became widespread, partly to attract holidaymakers, who filled the new churches and chapels in the seaside towns. Open-air services attracted huge numbers to Braddan; chapel and Sunday school anniversaries were splendid occasions; Moody and Sankey evenings were popular in country districts; and the increasingly English-speaking congregations adopted the new hymnbooks. Some traditional Manx tunes were used in the Methodist Hymn Book, notably W.H. Gill's Manx Fishermen's Evening Hymn to the tune ‘Peel Castle’. The decline of church music in the late 20th century led to few parish churches having regular choirs and many finding it difficult to appoint organists.

3. Social music after 1800.

Secular music was greatly affected by trading and immigration patterns during the 18th and early 19th centuries, and the influx of half-pay officers and debtors fleeing English prisons inevitably resulted in the importing of new styles and repertory. Professional and amateur musicians often seem to have worked together in bands, orchestras and choirs in concerts and festivals. Private teachers offered tuition in piano, singing, harp, guitar and cornet, as well as, anachronistically, figured bass. Many singers and instrumentalists learnt their skills by joining one of the many bands and choirs which flourished in villages and towns. These were often church-based or linked with the many friendly and benevolent societies, which had an important charitable function before the introduction of the welfare state. After playing anthems and psalms on Sundays, musicians provided quadrilles, quicksteps and polkas during the week at functions ranging from barn dances to formal balls at the Assembly Rooms in Douglas. Concerts of sacred and secular music were popular, and often featured singers from Ireland and the north of England, while string bands and formal orchestras began to be active in about the 1870s. A huge amount of sheet music was published, featuring songs, ballads and dance music, much of it aimed at the growing tourist industry. Visitors from northern England and Scotland were richly entertained with indoor concerts, outdoor band music and music hall. Some of the songs lived on, including Ellan Vannin, which many thought was the national anthem.

The tourist industry had a far-reaching effect on popular music in the 20th century, with dance bands led by Joe Loss, Ivy Benson and Ronnie Aldrich and others entertaining holidaymakers and residents alike. The growth of radio and recorded music hastened the decline of vernacular music, which began to be seen as old-fashioned. The 1960s and 70s saw a proliferation of subscription concerts, festivals such as the Mananan Festival, and international competitions for viola, harp and double bass. Amateur music-making is spurred on by the Manx Music Festival (‘the Guild’), which celebrated its centenary in 1992 and is the highlight of the year, particularly for singers. There are several active choirs and the instrumental tradition has strengthened since the 1970s. Youth groups flourish outside the educational system, and the high standards of the Manx Youth Band have developed alongside the revival of town bands and a popular brass band festival.

4. Traditional music.

Increasing international awareness of nationhood was reflected in an interest in ethnic music, which began with Mona Melodies (1820), the first publication of Manx tunes arranged for voice and piano, and peaked in 1896 with W.H. Gill's Manx National Song Book and A.W. Moore's Manx Ballads and Music. The remarkable work of the late 19th-century collectors, such as Gill, Moore and John Clague, rescued over 300 popular songs, ballads, instumental melodies, sacred pieces and dance tunes, which had been transmitted orally and became the basis of the folk revival. Music and dance had survived in the 17th and 18th centuries despite opposition from the established church, which often ‘presented’ musicians to the ecclesiastical courts for breaking the Sabbath.

An early form of non-liturgical sacred music was the carval, a form closely related to medieval and pre-Reformation carols. In the 17th and 18th centuries carvals were the province of educated composers and authors, but by the 19th they could be heard at Oiell Verrees, a form of entertainment which took place after the minister had left the church on Christmas Eve. They were sung to popular Manx tunes by male soloists, who composed their own verses based on biblical texts, including the Nativity; the most popular story was that of the prodigal son. The performance began at the west end of the church, the singer taking a step forwards at the beginning of each verse. The tradition became increasingly associated with rural areas; although the character of the melodies varied, most were exclusively Manx in origin and show little trace of the wider influences that appear in other parts of the repertory.

Musical styles reflecting the island's history – including Celtic laments and lullabies, tunes with Scandinavian features, early English dances and carols, pagan and Christian ritual music (notably the mummers' play The White Boys) and 18th-century ballads – were adapted by Manx musicians, often with some sophistication. Fiddle music dominated the instrumental tradition and old Christmas and wedding customs (many similar to those in Scotland and Scandinavia) were still being observed in Douglas in the mid-19th century, lingering longer in the countryside. By the time the 19th-century collectors were at work, performance styles were only hinted at, and the songtexts were often incomplete or heavily censored. Popular tunes were constantly adapted for contemporary use; new words to commemorate tragic events such as the wreck of the herring fleet in 1787 were fitted to earlier laments and Gill's arrangement of the major version of ‘Mylecharaine’ was to become the Manx national anthem.

Developments in popular music led to changes in the oral tradition. Most musicians in the first 70 years of the 20th century learnt their Manx tunes from The Manx National Song Book, but as Sophia Morrison, Mona Douglas and later collectors were to discover, not all traditional music had died. Local chruinnaghts and eisteddfods continued to be held, even after the demise in the 1930s of the Chruinnaght Ashoonagh Vannin (Manx National Gathering). Choral and orchestral arrangements by Elgar, Vaughan Williams, Arnold Foster and Haydn Wood, as well as Manx composers such as J.E. Quayle, gave opportunities to amateurs to perform traditional music in contemporary styles. Using 19th-century notebooks, traditional dance was recreated by Mona Douglas and Leighton Stowell in the 1930s, and continues strong, with new compositions actively encouraged and performed. Oiell Verrees and hymn-raising also continue to be popular, particularly in country areas. Led by Mona Douglas, the successful revival of Yn Chruinnaght in 1976 gave a new impetus to Manx music, and the festival's links with other major Celtic festivals in Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Cornwall and Brittany fuelled the growth of traditional music and dance. The movement was further stimulated by Colin Jerry's publications of tunes from the notebooks of the early collectors, previously difficult of access, and the appearance of the second volume of the Manx National Song Book (1979), edited by Charles Guard. Tapes and CDs chart stylistic changes from the 1960s through the performances and compositions of groups and individuals including Phynodderee, the Mannin Folk, Charles Guard, Stuart Slack, Bernard Osborne and Peter Lumb, the Mollag Band, MacTullough Vannin, Caarjyn Cooidjagh, Emma Christian and Paitchyn Vannin.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

J.C. Fargher and A.W. Moore: Carvalyn Gailckagh (Isle of Man, 1891)

W.H. Gill: Manx National Song Book (London, 1896)

A.W. Moore, ed.: Manx Ballads and Music (London, 1896)

A.G. Gilchrist: ‘Manx Folk Songs’, Journal of the Folk Song Society, xxviii (1924), 99–193; xxix (1925), 203–76; xxx (1926), 281–327

C.I. Paton: ‘Manx Carvals and Carval Books with Notes on some of the Manuscripts’, Isle of Man Natural History and Antiquarian Society Proceedings, ii/4 (1926), 480–501

P.W. Caine: ‘Manx Carols and their Writers’, Isle of Man Natural History and Antiquarian Society Proceedings, ii/4 (1926), 393–402

M. Douglas and A. Foster: Twelve Manx Folk Songs [3 sets] (London, 1928–57)

A.P. Graves, ed.: ‘Manx Folk Songs’, Celtic Song Book (London, 1928), 151–80

J.E. Quayle: ‘Manx music’, Isle of Man Natural History and Antiquarian Society Proceedings, iv/2 (1938)

M. Douglas: ‘Folk Song and Dance in Mann with some Notes on Collection and Revival of the Dances’, Proceedings of the Scottish Anthropological and Folklore Society, iv/1 (1949), 51–60

P. Kennedy: ‘Songs in Manx Gaelic’, Folksongs of Britain and Ireland (London, 1975), 179–202

I.M. Killip: ‘The White Boys and the Mollag Band’, Journal of the Manx Museum, vii/88 (1976), 201–5

C. Guard: The Manx National Song Book, ii (Isle of Man, 1979)

C. Jerry: Kiaull Vannin (Isle of Man, 1987)

M. Faragher: With Heart, Soul and Voice: 100 Years of the Manx Music Festival (Hawes, 1992)

F.E. Bazin: ‘Music and Society in the Isle of Man 1800–60’, Isle of Man Natural History and Antiquarian Society Proceedings, x/3 (1996), 179–99

F.E. Bazin: ‘From the Midnight Hills’: a Performing Edition of 32 West Gallery Anthems from Edward Quayle's Music Book (Isle of Man, 1999)

FENELLA BAZIN