Examines the life and work of Scottish cellist and antiquarian John Gunn
(1766-1824) through newly discovered sources.
The Scottish cellist and antiquarian John Gunn (1766-1824) is unique
among British writers on music in the late eighteenth and early
nineteenth century. Learned and practical, at home in classical and
modern languages, knowledgeable in a wide range of musical topics and
with even wider-ranging interests, and committed to the ideal of
progress through rational thought, he typified the Enlightenment. His
published output was large and diverse: a cello treatise in two quite
different editions; two books on the flute and one on the piano; a
treatise on figured bass; a history of the harp in the Highlands; and a
translation of a French work of music theory. The list of his unrealised
publications is even longer, including a proof of the oriental origins
of the Scots. He married Anne Young, a well-known Edinburgh piano
teacher, and his letters cast new light on the circumstances and date of
her death. Taking account of Gunn's diverse experiences as a
musician-scholar in Cambridge, London and Edinburgh, studying his sundry
occupations, and exploring his social connections through a recently
unearthed cache of his letters, this study moves away from 'treatise
archaeology' and offers a broader view than is usually possible with
such figures. The book will be of interest to those studying historical
performance practice, music education in Enlightenment Britain, and the
dissemination of Enlightenment thought.
