McGill Library
McLennan Library Building3459 rue McTavish
Montreal, Quebec
H3A 0C9
D. Torrance Fraser donation
Series
4 volumes of choral sheet music
The Montreal Mendelssohn Choir was one of the longest-running musical institutions in Montreal in the nineteenth century. Formed in 1864 by eight choristers from Montreal’s Presbyterian community and directed by Joseph Gould (1833-1913), the Choir grew to include sixty-five members by 1880 and over one hundred in the early 1890s. It served as a musical club for the city’s prosperous English merchant and business classes, with an artistic mission that emphasized good singing of unaccompanied part-song repertoire. The Choir disbanded in 1894 and subsequently donated to McGill University the contents of its musical library in addition to 250 volumes of musical literature.
Three volumes of choral sheet music from the Choir’s library were donated to McGill University by the Estate of D. Torrance Fraser, a former choir member, in 1926. The pieces in these three volumes are second copies of those pieces found in Series 1. In 1927, another volume of sheet music from the Choir’s library was donated to McGill University by the Estate of D. Torrance Fraser. This fourth volume (DTF2) contains many pieces not found in the other volumes.
The Joseph Could Collection, held at Library and Archives Canada, includes a volume of sheet music with almost identical content to that in the fourth volume (DTF2) donated in 1927.
Description of these volumes in on-going.