Grove's dictionary of music and musicians

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30 RAYMOND AND AGNES KEADE
Thomas A., born in 1775, who studied
a son,
music under his father and Dittenhofer. He
composed some instrumental music performed
at the Professional Concerts, became a violinist
at the Opera and the best concerts, and a teacher
of the pianoforte, violin, and thorough-bass.
He composed and arranged many pieces for the
pianoforte, and some songs, and died about the
middle of the 19th century. w. H. H.
RAYMOND AND AGNES. A 'grand
romantic English Opera in three acts ' ; words
by E. Fitzball, music by E. J. Loder. Produced
at Manchester in 1855, and at St. James's
Theatre, London, June 11, 1859. g.
RE. The second note of the natural scale in
solraisation and in the nomenclature of France
and Italy, as TJt (or Do) is the first, Mi the
third, and Fa the fourth
Ut queant laxis resonare fibris
Mira, gestorum, /amuli tuorum.
By the Germans and English it is called D. G.
RE PASTORp, IL. A dramatic cantata to
Metastasio's words (with compressions), composed
by Mozart at Salzburg in 1775, in honour
of the Archduke Maximilian. First performed
April 23, 1775. It contains an overture and
fourteen numbers. The autograph is in the
Royal Library at Berlin, and the work is published
in Breitkopfs complete edition as Series
V. No. 10. Aminta's air, 'L'amer6,' with
violin obbligato, is the number by which the
work is most widely known. g.
REA, William, born in London, March 25,
1827 ; when about ten years old learnt the
pianoforte and organ from Josiah Pittman, for
whom he acted as deputy for several years. In
about 1843 he was appointed organist to Christchurch,
Watney Street, St. George's-in-the-East,
and at the same time studied the pianoforte,
composition, and instrumentation under Sterndale
Bennett, appearing as a pianist at the
concerts of the Society of British Musicians in
1845. On leaving Christchurch he was appointed
organist to St. Andrew Undershaft. In 1849
he went to Leipzig, where his masters were
Moscheles and Richter ; he subsequently studied
under Dreyschock at Prague. On his return
to England, Mr. Rea gave chamber concerts at
the Beethoven Rooms, and became (1853)
organist to the Harmonic Union. In 1856 he
founded the London Polyhymnian Choir, to
the training of which he devoted much time,
and with excellent results ;
at the same time
he conducted an amateur orchestral society. In
1858 he was appointed organist at St. Michael's,
Stookwell, and in 1860 was chosen by competition
organist to the corporation of Newcastleon-Tyne,
where he also successively filled the
same post at three churches in succession, and
at the Elswick Road Chapel. At Newcastle
Mr. Rea worked hard to diffuse a taste for good
music, though he met with less encouragement
than his labours and enthusiasm deserved.
Besides weekly organ and pianoforte recitals,
he formed n choir of eighty voices, which iu
1862 was amalgamated with the existing Sacred
Harmonic Society of Newcastle. In 1867 he
began a series of excellent orchestral concerts
which were carried on every season for nine
years, when he was compelled to discontinue
them, owing to the pecuniary loss which they
entailed. In 1876 he gave two performances
of 'Antigone' at the Theatre Royal, and devoted
much of his time to training his choir (200
voices), the Newcastle Amateur Vocal Society,
and other Societies on the Tyne and in Sunderland,
besides giving concerts at which the best
artists performed. His published works comprise
four songs, three organ pieces, and some
anthems. At the close of 1 880 he was appointed
organist of St. Hilda's, S. Shields, in 1888 he
resigned the corporation appointment. [He
was an honorary Fellow of the Royal College
of Organists, and in 1886 received the honorary
degree of Mus.D. from the University of Durham.
He composed a ' Jubilee Ode ' for the Newcastle
Exhibition of 1887, and he died at Newcastle,
March 8, 1903. An account of his life and
works is in Mvsical Times, April 1903. His
Emma Mary {rde Woolhouse), was an ac-
wife,
complished musician, actively connected with
the musical life of Newcastle. She died May 6,
1693. p. K.] w! B. s.
READE, Chakles, English dramatist and
novelist— born June 8, 1814, died April 11,
1884—claims a notice in his capacity of «xpert
connoisseur, and one of the earliest collectors of
old violins. He devoted much time to the
study of violin construction, and—as his sons
put it—acquired as keen a scent '
for the habitat
of a rare violin, as the truffle dog for fungus
beneath the roots of the trees.' He gathered
much of this accurate knowledge from one
Henri, a player ajid a maker to boot, resident in
Soho, with whom he engaged in experiments in
varnish, and in the business of importing fiddles
from abroad for the English dealers. Frequent
visits to Paris, in the latter connection, resulted
sometimes in profit, and at other times in financial
catastrophe ; but they succeeded in bringing
to England some of the finest specimens of
Cremona instruments that are known to-day.
They were in Paris, buying a stock of thirty
fiddles, when the Revolution of 1848 broke out,
and Henri threw aside fiddle-dealing and joined
the revolutionists. He was shot before his
friend's eyes at the first barricade, and Charles
Reade escaped with difficulty, leaving the fiddles
behind. These were found stored away in a
cellar after the Revolution, and eventually
reached Reade, who records that he sold one
of them for more than he paid for the whole
lot. At the time of the Special Loan Exhibition
of Musical Instruments held at the South
Kensington Museum in 1872, Reade wrote a