Concerts, Publications, Operas

Abstract WITH the execution of the king on 30 January 1649 and the proclamation of a Commonwealth and Free State the following May, the Chapel Royal and the King’s Musick were no more. In practice they must have ceased to exist when the king gave himself up to the Scots in 1646, though money owing to them continued to be paid. A warrant made out to Lawes by the Parliamentary Receiver-General in April 1647 for £6 13s. 4d. was no doubt welcome, but it underlined the fact this was the end of the road. The future must have looked bleak. He was now dependent on the Egertons, and conceivably might have been satisfied with such an existence-as a number of his ex-colleagues from the Royal Music were, John Wilson among them-but Lawes threw himself into London musical life, which was about to enter a period of rapid expansion. As the leading song composer of the time and with a wide circle of aristocratic and literary acquaintances, setting himself up as a fashionable teacher seemed an obvious line to take. Hardly surprisingly, his name appears at the top of a list of ‘excellent and able Masters For the Voyce or Viole’ printed by Playford in his Musical! Banquet (I 65 I).