Benjamin Carr (1768-1831)
- The federal overture (1794)
Performers: Sinfonia Finlandia Jyväskylä; Patrick Gallois (conductor)
Drawing: Joseph Yeager (c.1792-1859) - Procession of Victuallers of Philadelphia, on the 15th of March 1821
Further info: The 18th Century American Overture
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English composer, publisher, and performer. Son of Joseph Carr
(1739-1819), he studied the organ with Charles Wesley and composition
with Samuel Arnold, and probably learnt engraving at his father's shop
in London. After 1789 he assisted Arnold as harpsichordist and principal
tenor for the Academy of Ancient Music, and his earliest known opera,
Philander and Silvia, was performed at Sadler's Wells Theatre in October
1792. In 1793 he immigrated to the United States where he worked as a
singer and musician at the Chestnut Street Theatre, making his debut the
following year. He also established a business selling musical
instruments and, eventually, as a publisher. He was choir director at
the St. Augustine Episcopal Church in Philadelphia, as well as a
founding member of the Musical Fund Society. As a composer, his works
include six stage pieces (operas, ballets), around 50 songs (his setting
of Scott's Hymn to the Virgin [1810] is generally considered the finest
early American song), a Federal Overture (his most famous orchestral
work), 12 keyboard sonatas (as well as other keyboard works). He also
regularly published music in journals and magazines for the public,
including Carr’s Musical Miscellany. His brother Thomas Carr (1780-1849)
was also a composer and organist, mainly active in Philadelphia.
