St James's Hall - Other Uses

Other Uses

The Bach Choir, established in 1875 under a founding committee including Sir George Grove and Sir John Stainer, had as a primary aim the introduction to England of Bach's Mass in B Minor. With a choir of between 200 and 250 voices, including the Swedish Nightingale, Jenny Lind, and under the baton of her husband, conductor Otto Goldschmidt, the Mass came to performance in April 1876 at St James's Hall, and a second performance was given a month later.

Henry J. Wood performed the E minor organ concerto of Ebenezer Prout at the Hall with an orchestra under Joseph Barnby, in the late 1880s. Although the performance earned him much praise, he referred to the instrument as 'that terrible box of whistles at St. James's Hall'. This had not seemed to bother Camille Saint-Saëns when he premiered his third Symphony there (in which two sections make extensive use of the organ) in 1886. Saint-Saëns was a fine organist, and was titulaire of Église de la Madeleine in Paris. If he had any objections to the organ of St. James Hall for the premier of his symphony, they do not appear in his writings.

The Stock Exchange Orchestral Society, founded 1883, originally played in the Prince's Hall Piccadilly, but transferred to St. James's Hall until 1894, when they moved to Queen's Hall. In December 1893 Harry Plunket Greene and Leonard Borwick began their celebrated partnership in lieder recitals at the hall, which continued well into the new century. In 1895, the 16-year-old pianist Mark Hambourg gave a concert there under Henry J. Wood, in which he played three piano concerti.