New autograph manuscript of English composer Henry Purcell identified by Andrew Woolley, EMS researcher

A manuscript discovered in an archive in Norfolk, UK, has been identified as a partial autograph of the seventeenth-century English composer Henry Purcell by Andrew Woolley (Early Music Studies Group). The manuscript was discovered by Caro Lesemann-Elliott (Royal Holloway, University of London), a member of a team working for a research project financed by the UK Arts and Humanities Research Council that seeks to investigate music in county council archives in England.

The leader of the research project, Stephen Rose (Royal Holloway, University of London), asked Andrew to examine the manuscript, who recognised that three of the Purcell pieces it contains, from the Suite Z. 661, are in the composer’s handwriting. The manuscript is a deluxe volume, probably originally owned by a wealthy patron who asked Purcell to copy his music into it.

In the 18th century, other musicians added pieces to the manuscript by Purcell and his contemporary, John Blow, including an organist at Canterbury Cathedral. In the nineteenth century, it came into the hands of a counciler from the town of Thetford who used it to create an index to the council’s records. Andrew Woolley is currently in the process of preparing a complete edition of Purcell’s keyboard music for the Purcell Society.

The discovery was reported in the British newspaper The Guardian.