Curwen, John, 1821-1901

Epithet: of Add MS 36045

John Curwen (1816-1880) was an English congregational minister who made an impact on music education through his Tonic Sol-fa pedagogical method. Curwen learned to read music by using a book authored by Sarah Glover that presented her Norwich Sol-fa method for reading notated music. Curwen adapted Glover's method to create his own system, which he referred to as "Tonic Sol-fa." This method replaces traditional musical notation with solfege syllables (do-re-mi-fa) using "moveable do" (where "do" is always the tonic). In Curwen's notation, the first letter of the proper syllable/pitch to be sung appears and rhythm is indicated through the use of bar lines, half bar lines, and semicolons prefixing strong beats, medium beats, and weak beats respectively in each measure. Subdivisions of beats are marked using a full stop for half divisions and a comma for quarter divisions; continuation of a tone from one beat to the next is shown by a dash.

Curwen's main purpose in creating this system was to facilitate music literacy in a three step process: firstly reading from his sol-fa notation, secondly reading from staff notation in conjunction with sol-fa notation, and finally reading from traditional staff notation alone. Motivated by his belief that music should be the inheritance of all classes and ages, Curwen went to great personal expense to publish his own writings which included a textbook, The Standard Course of Lessons on the Tonic Sol-fa Method of Teaching to Sing, (1858) and a journal, Tonic Sol-fa Reporter and Magazine of Vocal Music for the People . After 1864, Curwen resigned from his position as a minister to devote more time to music education, eventually starting a publishing firm with his son, J. Curwen & Sons, that later added "Tonic Sol-Fa Agency" to its name. In 1869 John Curwen established the Tonic Sol-Fa College which, just over 100 years later, founded the Curwen Institute in London.