Richard Alexander Streatfeild (22 June 1866 – 6 February 1919) was an English musicologist and critic. His career was spent at the

British Museum The British Museum is a Museum, public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is the largest in the world. It documents the story of human cu ...

, although not in its music department. His publications included books on opera,

Handel George Frideric (or Frederick) Handel ( ; baptised , ; 23 February 1685 – 14 April 1759) was a German-British Baroque composer well-known for his operas, oratorios, anthems, concerti grossi, and organ concerti. Born in Halle, Germany, H ...

and modern music. He had literary interests and arranged for posthumous publication of his friend Samuel Butler's ''

The Way of All Flesh ''The Way of All Flesh'' (originally titled ''Ernest Pontifex or the Way of All Flesh'') is a semi-autobiographical novel by Samuel Butler that attacks Victorian-era hypocrisy. Written between 1873 and 1884, it traces four generations of the ...

''.

Life and career

Streatfeild was born in

Carshalton Carshalton ( ) is a town, with a historic village centre, in south London, England, within the London Borough of Sutton. It is situated around southwest of Charing Cross and around east by north of Sutton town centre, in the valley of the Rive ...

Surrey Surrey () is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Greater London to the northeast, Kent to the east, East Sussex, East and West Sussex to the south, and Hampshire and Berkshire to the wes ...

,King, Alec Hyatt
"Streatfeild, Richard Alexander"
Grove Music Online, Oxford University Press, retrieved 5 March 2014 the son of Frank Newton Streatfeild, a diplomat in Southern Africa."Obituary, Mr R A Streatfeild", ''The Times'', 8 February 1919, p. 11 He was educated at

Oundle Oundle () is a market town and civil parish on the left bank of the River Nene in North Northamptonshire, England, which had a population of 6,254 at the time of the 2021 United Kingdom census, 2021 census. It is north of London and south-wes ...

and

Pembroke College, Cambridge Pembroke College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge, England. The college is the third-oldest college of the university and has over 700 students and fellows. It is one of the university's larger colleges, with buildings from ...

, where he graduated in

Classics Classics, also classical studies or Ancient Greek and Roman studies, is the study of classical antiquity. In the Western world, ''classics'' traditionally refers to the study of Ancient Greek literature, Ancient Greek and Roman literature and ...

. From 1889 until his death he served in the Department of Printed Books at the

. From 1898 to 1902 he was also music critic of ''

The Daily Graphic ''The Daily Graphic: An Illustrated Evening Newspaper'' was the first American newspaper with daily illustrations. It was founded in New York City in 1873 by Canadian engravers George-Édouard Desbarats and William Leggo, and began publicati ...

''. He was a frequent contributor to English and foreign journals. Although Streatfeild never worked in the musical department of the British Museum, music was his principal interest. He was an enthusiast for the modern music of his day, and also for the music of

. His first book, ''Masters of Italian Music'' (1895), was a study of

Verdi Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi ( ; ; 9 or 10 October 1813 – 27 January 1901) was an Italian composer best known for his operas. He was born near Busseto, a small town in the province of Parma, to a family of moderate means, recei ...

Boito Arrigo Boito (; born Enrico Giuseppe Giovanni Boito; 24 February 1842 10 June 1918) was an Italian librettist, composer, poet and critic whose only completed opera was ''Mefistofele''. Among the operas for which he wrote the libretti are Giuseppe ...

and later composers including

Puccini Giacomo Puccini (22 December 1858 29 November 1924) was an Italian composer known primarily for his operas. Regarded as the greatest and most successful proponent of Italian opera after Verdi, he was descended from a long line of composers, s ...

. In the ''

Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians ''The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'' is an encyclopedic dictionary of music and musicians. Along with the German-language '' Die Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart'', it is one of the largest reference works on the history and th ...

'' (2014), Alec Hyatt-King commented, "Streatfeild’s book on Handel, though old-fashioned in some respects, is a balanced and penetrating study which is still valuable." Streatfeild's 1897 book ''Opera'' was reissued several times during his lifetime and afterwards, with revisions by

J A Fuller Maitland John Alexander Fuller Maitland (7 April 1856 – 30 March 1936) was an influential British music critic and scholar from the 1880s to the 1920s. He encouraged the rediscovery of English music of the 16th and 17th centuries, particularly Henry Pu ...

and Edward J Dent. The 1907 edition was published online by

Project Gutenberg Project Gutenberg (PG) is a volunteer effort to digitize and archive cultural works, as well as to "encourage the creation and distribution of eBooks." It was founded in 1971 by American writer Michael S. Hart and is the oldest digital li ...

in 2005."The Project Gutenberg EBook of ''The Opera'', by R. A. Streatfeild"
Project Gutenberg, retrieved 5 March 2014 Streatfeild also had literary interests, and was the literary executor of Samuel Butler. Under Streatfeild's supervision Butler's novel ''

'' was published in altered form in 1903, the year after the death of its author. Streatfeild died in London at the age of 52.

Books by Streatfeild

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Notes

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Streatfeild, R A 1866 births 1919 deaths English music critics British classical music critics English writers about music Handel scholars People educated at Oundle School Puccini scholars