Musician, author, and music teacher, Annie Patterson was born 27 October 1868 in Lurgan, Co. Armagh, daughter of Thomas Rankin Patterson, bakery owner, and Martha Macaulay Patterson (née Wilson), a distant relative of Lord Macaulay. She attended Alexandra College, Dublin, on a scholarship, studying music under Dr James Culwick (d. 1907). She continued her studies at the RIAM under Robert Stewart and obtained a BA and Mus.B. (1887) and a Mus.D. (1889) from the RUI. Patterson was the first woman in Ireland or Britain to receive a doctorate in music that was not honorary.. She made her debut as a solo organist at the age of 15 and was the organist at several Dublin churches (1887–97). She acted as an examiner in music at the RUI (1892–5) and at TCD (1892–5). During the 1890s she became interested in the Irish language, taking classes and joining the Gaelic League. She encouraged the notion that the development of the language should be accompanied by a revival in Irish music. She published Six original Gaelic songs (1896) and was the prime mover behind the first Feis Ceoil, which met in Dublin, 18 May 1897. She was on the organising committee of the first Oireachtas, held in the Round Room of the Rotunda, Dublin, on the day following the Feis Ceoil. She conducted a choir which had been especially assembled to sing Gaelic songs for the occasion, and composed the music for ‘Go mairidh ár nGaedhilg slán’, an anthem for the Gaelic League, the words of which were written by Dermot Foley. Her commitment to fusing classical music with the Irish cultural revival is reflected in her composition of two operas, ‘The high-king’s daughter’ and ‘Oisín’.
She had conducted the Dublin Choral Union (1891–3) and in 1898 she moved to London to become conductor of the Hampstead Harmonic Society. She lived in London until 1908, during which time she published The story of oratario (1902), Schumann (1903), and Chats with music lovers (1905). She then went to Cork to become the organist at St Anne’s, Shandon, prompting her to write a choral piece, ‘The bells of Shandon’. She was examiner in music at the Cork Municipal School of Music (1914–19) and the Leinster School of Music (1919–26). In 1924 she was appointed corporation lecturer in music at UCC, a position she held until her death. Among her other publications were How to listen to an orchestra (1913) and The profession of music (1926). She also contributed to various journals and gave a series of popular radio broadcasts. She had to cancel a broadcast when she fell ill with a cold in January 1934. The cold became pleurisy and she died 16 January at 43 South Mall, Cork. She left £1,632.
Contributed by
Murphy, William
Sources
W. A. Houston Collison, Dr Collison in and on Ireland (1908), 136; O’Donoghue; Cork Examiner, Ir. Independent, Ir. Press, 17 Jan. 1934; WWW; Stanley Sadie (ed.), The new Grove dictionary of music and musicians, xiv (1980); Anne V. O’Connor and Susan M. Parkes, Gladly learn and gladly teach (1984), 85; Donncha Ó Suilleabháin, Scéal an Oireachtas 1897–1924 (1984), 15, 95; DIH; Beathaisnéis 1882–1982, iii; John A. Murphy, The college (1995), 242; Kit and Cyril Ó Céirín, Women of Ireland: a biographic dictionary (1996); Fintan Vallely (ed.), The companion to Irish traditional music (1999), 121, 279
PUBLISHING INFORMATION
DOI: https://doi.org/10.3318/dib.007229.v1
Originally published October 2009 as part of the Dictionary of Irish Biography Contributed by
Murphy, William
Last revised October 2009
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