From the Archives: Become an RSM digital volunteer
RSM's earliest surviving minute books, previously photographed onto microfilm in the 1980s, have recently been converted into digital images, which we now need your help to make the most of.
The opening page of the minute books
In order to make the historic minutes more accessible to both a general and focused readership we intend to upload these images to our website. The images will show the earliest extant eighteenth- and nineteenth-century minutes in the handwriting of the secretaries of the period. In order to make the content even more accessible to researchers and users around the world we invite Members, their friends and acquaintances, and other readers of this page, to become a digital transcriber.
Above shows an image, and a below transcription of the text, of the opening page of the minute books. We invite expressions of interest in doing some gentle transcribing of these documents which will help reveal early Membership history and musical networks of the period.
If you would like to help, please contact us on archive@rsmgb.org
“At a Meeting of the Governors of the Royal Society of Musicians, held at the Feathers Tavern in the Strand the 2nd. Day of January 1785.
Present
Mr. Anthony Shaw in the Chair
Mr. Simpson
Mr. Coles
Mr. Jackson
Mr. Jn. Jones
Mr. Aylward
Mr. Buckley
Mr. Dd. Richards
Mr. Lyon
Dr. Arnold
Visitors
Mr. Sarjant
Mr. Napier
Mr. Thos. Hill
Mr. Webbe
Assistants
Mr. Ashley
Mr. Hackwood
Mr. Eiffert
Mr. Dance
Mr Blake
Mr. Hodson
Mr. Wm. Parkinson
Mr. Asbridge
Mr Courtup
Mr. Hogg
Mr. Dupuis
The last Minutes were Read.
Then Mr. Louis Decamp was Balloted for, and Unanimously Elected.
Mr. Redmond Simpson gave in the Name of Mr. Samuel Green as an Honorary Subscriber, and Paid One Guinea.
Mr. Redmond Simpson gave in the Name of James Wyatt Esqr. as an Honorary Subscriber to pay Two Guineas pr. Annum.
Mr. Barrow gave in the Name of the Revd. Mr. Pearce, as an Honorary Subscriber, to pay one Guinea pr. Annum.
Mr. Napier gave in the Names Richard Sulivan Esqr. and Mrs. Richard Sulivan as Honorary Subscribers, to pay One Guinea each.
Mr. Dance informed the Governors that Mrs. Linton was deliver’d of a Child the 18th. of last Month, Resolved that Mrs. Linton be allowed Ten Shillings a Month for the said Child, and that Mrs. Horwood do pay to Mrs. Dance half a Guinea as a present to Mrs. Linton for Expenses during her Lying In.
”