Charles Dibdin (before 4 March 1745 – 25 July 1814) was an English composer, musician, dramatist, novelist, singer and actor. With over 600 songs to his name, for many of which he wrote both the lyrics and the music and performed them himself, he was in his time the most prolific English singer-songwriter. He is best known as the composer of "Tom Bowling",Tom Bowling one of his many sea songs, which often features at the Last Night of the Proms. He also wrote about 30 dramatic pieces, including the operas The Waterman (1774) and The Quaker (1775), and several novels, memoirs and histories.
Life and career
Early life and early successes The son of a silversmith,Robert Chambers' Book of Days. See C. Dibdin, Professional Life of Mr Dibdin (1803), Vol. 1 p. 15. Dibdin was privately baptised on 4 March 1745 in Southampton and is often described as the youngest child of eighteen born to a 50-year-old mother. His parents, intending him for the clergy, sent Dibdin to Winchester College, but his love of music soon diverted his thoughts from the clerical profession. He possessed 'a remarkable good voice' at a young age and was in demand for concerts even as a boy. Anthems were composed for him by James Kent and his successor Peter Fussell, organists of Winchester Cathedral, where he was a chorister between 1756 and 1759. He went to London at the age of fifteen at his brother's invitation, and was first employed tuning harpsichords in a music warehouse in Cheapside. Through Mr. BerengerPresumably Richard Berenger, Gentleman of the Horse 1760–1782, to whom David Garrick lent £280.10s.0d. in 1762, see The Private Correspondence of David Garrick, Vol 2 (Henry Colburn & Richard Bentley, London 1832), pp. 297–98. he was introduced to John Rich (of whom he became a favourite) and John Beard, and, growing addicted to theatre-going,Dibdin, Professional Life (1803), Vol 1, pp. 19–22. he soon became a singing actor at Theatre Royal, Covent Garden. As his voice was not yet settled, Rich thought he would become a bass, and marked out the pantomime roles of Richard Leveridge for him. Dibdin held back from this path, but made the most of his introductions: when Rich died in 1761 and Beard succeeded him as manager and part-proprietor, fresh opportunities arose.
With Beard's encouragement Dibdin wrote his first work, both words and music of The Shepherd's Artifice, an operetta in two acts, which was produced as Dibdin's benefit at Covent Garden on 21 May 1762 and repeated in 1763.G. Hogarth (Ed.), The Songs of Charles Dibdin, Chronologically Arranged, with Notes Historical, Biographical and Critical, with a Memoir of the Author, 2 Vols. (G.H. Davidson, London 1842, 1848), Vol. 1, p. 1. Dibdin, Professional Life (1803), Vol. 1 pp. 29–30.For a very extended listing of Dibdin's operas, 1764-1788, see Margaret Ross Griffel, Operas in English: A Dictionary Revised Edition (Scarecrow Press, 2012), pp. 748–750 Read here. As an actor, Dibdin had constant opportunities to study Garrick's performances, and befriended his associates, notably his prompter, who could remember Cibber. He enjoyed two seasons touring at the Vauxhall in Birmingham, and another at Richmond. Beard exercised a benign and encouraging influence over Dibdin's early career, choosing him, in his first important appearance, for the part of Ralph, in the 1765 premiere of Samuel Arnold's opera The Maid of the Mill at Covent Garden. He gained so much success over a run of more than fifty nights, that 'Ralph' handkerchiefs were worn in compliment to him. He agreed to article himself, both as actor and musician, to Beard for three years at a salary rising from three to five pounds a week. However, his contract established a precedent by which actors were not paid in case of absence through sickness.Dibdin, Professional Life (1803), Vol. 1, pp. 46–54.
The script for The Maid of the Mill was by playwright Isaac Bickerstaffe, who had written the libretto for Love in a Village, the highly popular opera (called the first English comic opera) by Dr. Thomas Arne, produced in 1762. For Dibdin the next turning-point was in the 1767 premiere and short run of Bickerstaffe's Love in the City, in which he played Watty Cockney, and for which he produced a good deal of the music and airs. He had already confided to Beard that he disliked acting because of the jealousy and spite which his success brought upon him from other actors. Hence he had turned again to composition. But now some of the orchestra complained to Beard that his music was discreditable to the theatre: whereupon Dibdin obtained the direct intervention of Dr. Arne, who (according to Dibdin) pronounced that this was a scandalous attempt to ruin the reputation of a young man whom it was their duty to encourage and protect. Love in the City was abandoned, but Dibdin's music was successful and was transferred into a play called The Romp.Dibdin, Professional Life (1803), Vol. 1 pp. 53–57. The association with Bickerstaffe continued in Dibdin's music for the play Lionel and Clarissa at Covent Garden in 1767,Lionel and Clarissa, a Comic Opera (W. Griffin, London 1768) Read here. the year of Beard's retirement.
Drury Lane with Garrick By 1768, his articles completed, and receiving harsh treatment from his new manager George Colman, Dibdin was ready to part company with Covent Garden. Garrick, who had coached him a little at Richmond in the previous year, was eager to win over Bickerstaffe to Drury Lane: and as hopes for his new play The Padlock projected for the Haymarket Theatre faded, Garrick acquired it, and acquired Dibdin as composer, whose music for this work was, at Garrick's suggestion, given anonymously. Dibdin made only £40 from it while Bickerstaffe made a fortune. The Padlock was produced at Drury Lane under Garrick's management in 1768, Dibdin taking the part of Mungo (a blackface roleFor a description of the character of Mungo, see The Private Correspondence of David Garrick Vol. 1 (Henry Colburn & Richard Bentley, London 1831), p. xlvi. For an illustration of Dibdin in the role, see 'Mr. Dibden in the Character of Mungo in the Celebrated Opera of the Padlock', engraved for Robert Sayer and John Smith, Dramatic characters, or different portraits of the English stage (London 1769–73), (after miniature drawing by Johann Ludwig Wernhard Fäsch, cf. Harvard University, Houghton Library Catalogue ref. MS Thr 647): See at Folger Shakespeare Library, ART File D544.5 .) so as to cause "that degree of sensation in the public which is called a rage."For a discussion of the impact of this role, see Monica L. Miller, Slaves to Fashion: Black Dandyism and the Styling of Black Diasporic Identity (Duke University Press, 2010), Chapter 1 'Mungo Macaroni' at pp. 27–31.
In 1769 for Garrick (who had placed him under some financial obligation) he also composed for Garrick's Shakespeare Jubilee at Stratford, but found that Garrick had quietly substituted commissions to Arne and to Boyce. Garrick, it seemed, wished to control both Bickerstaffe and Dibdin, in case their work should find other patrons, and busied them both, inducing Dibdin to revise and write new music for Cibber's Damon and Phillida.Hogarth (Ed.), Songs of Charles Dibdin (1848), Vol. 1 p. 5. Dibdin, Professional Life (1803), Vol. 1 pp. 70–74, 79–81. In addition he provided the score for Bickerstaffe's burletta The Recruiting Serjeant, and for his The Maid the Mistress, and The Ephesian Matron in that year, which were all produced in 1769 at Ranelagh Gardens under a two-year contract with the Ranelagh managers for £100 per annum for whatever music he should supply them with.Dibdin, Professional Life (1803), Vol. 1 p. 73.
Dibdin set a text by Garrick for The Installation of the Garter in 1771. In February 1773 the comic opera The Wedding Ring based on an Italian opera Il filosofo di campagna was brought out, but was almost withdrawn on the first night owing to the rumour that it was written by Bickerstaffe, who had fled to France, utterly ruined by the accusation of an 'abominable (i.e. homosexual) attempt'. Dibdin was obliged to appear on stage and claim authorship of both words and music, while salacious tittle-tattle (and worse) sought to embroil both him and Garrick in Bickerstaffe's offence.Hogarth (Ed.), Songs of Charles Dibdin (1848), Vol. 1 p. 8. See also 'List of Publications of Charles Dibdin' in the same, pp. xxxiii–xxxiv. In November 1773, in a production of the musical drama The Deserter which he had adapted from the French opera of 1769 by Michel-Jean Sedaine and Pierre-Alexandre Monsigny, he introduced the song 'There was a miller's daughter' and modified other songs without Garrick's knowledge or consent, but with great success.Hogarth (Ed.), Songs of Charles Dibdin (1848), Vol. 1 p. 37. During the same year he worked closely with Garrick at Hampton to compose songs and music for Garrick's winter piece, The Christmas Tale. From this ordeal he acquired the technique of composing the music entire in his mind, writing down nothing until the finished manuscript was needed: to this method he afterwards adhered.Dibdin, Professional Life (1803) Vol. 1 pp. 102–04.
Meanwhile, from 1772 he was also engaged by Thomas King to write regularly for Sadler's Wells, and in that year produced songs for the Musical Dialogues The Palace of Mirth and Bickerstaffe's The Brickdustman.Hogarth (Ed.), Songs of Charles Dibdin (1848), Vol. 1 pp. 6–7. He followed that in 1773 with the interlude The Mischance, and the dialogues The Grenadier (text by Garrick), The Ladle, England against Italy, and None so blind as those who won't see:Hogarth (Ed.), Songs of Charles Dibdin (1848), Vol. 1 pp. 9, 16–19. and furthermore in the same year he wrote songs for The Trip to Portsmouth (words by G. A. Stevens), performed by Charles Bannister at the Haymarket, for which the overture and dances were written by Thomas Arne.Hogarth (Ed.), Songs of Charles Dibdin (1848), Vol. 1 p. 19.
Dibdin's most lasting opera, The Waterman, a comic opera, the music of which he sold for £30, was produced first at the Haymarket Theatre in 1774.The Waterman; or, The First of August: A Ballad Opera, in Two Acts (T. Becket, London 1774). Cast: Tug, Charles Bannister; Mr Bundle, Mr Wilson; Robin, Mr. Weston; Mrs Bundle, Mrs Thompson; Wilelmina, Mrs Jewell. Read here. His dialogues and songs for The Cobbler, or, A Wife of Ten Thousand (based on Sedaine's Blaise le savetier), were acted as a ballad opera at Drury Lane in 1774,For the circumstances, see Dibdin, Professional Life (1803) Vol. 1 pp. 140–44. and his famous short opera The Quaker was produced there on 3 May 1775, which Dibdin had sold to Brereton for £70, who sold it on to Garrick for a hundred.Hogarth (Ed.), Songs of Charles Dibdin (1848), Vol. 1 pp. 51, 53. Charles Bannister was again prominent in the cast of all three operas. After being connected with Drury Lane both as composer and as actor for several years, a series of disagreements with Garrick,See a letter of 1775 from Dibdin to Garrick, defending himself against an imputation of breach of contract, in Private Correspondence of David Garrick, Vol. 2 (1832), pp. 119–20. partly over Dibdin's desertion of his second partner Mrs Davenet and his children by her,J.W. Ebsworth, "Dibdin, Charles" in (old) Dictionary of National Biography Vol. XV. led to the termination of his engagement.
Sadler's Wells, Haymarket and Covent Garden