Overview

One of London’s best-kept secrets, Hoxton Hall, built in 1863, is one of only a handful of surviving Victorian music halls in Britain. This book presents a history of the building and its role in the social life of a deprived but resilient area of the city, celebrating the Hall’s reopening in 2015 after a two-year, Heritage Lottery-funded, refurbishment. This landmark volume charts the Hall’s many different guises over more than a century and a half of activity, from its founding as exemplar of Victorian rational recreation to a working-class variety music hall; from headquarters of a prominent evangelical temperance movement to outpost of a Quaker East-End mission; from pioneer of 1970s community arts to today’s multipurpose centre reflecting the diversity of the neighbourhood it still serves. The wide-ranging contributions gathered here offer an invaluable lens for understanding an area of London that has experienced comprehensive social change during the lifetime of the venue. This unique history of a building brings together scholars of architectural, theatrical, musical and entertainment history, and of social and religious history, to chart the various lives of Hoxton Hall and those who have been drawn to this remarkable space.

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9781804130339

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Author Information

Nicholas Till is a historian, theorist and practitioner of opera and music theatre, and is Emeritus Professor of Opera and Music Theatre at the universities of Sussex and Amsterdam. He has had a long association with Hoxton Hall since he first worked there as a volunteer in 1984. Nadia Valman is Professor of Urban Literature at Queen Mary University of London. She researches the history and culture of East London.

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