Richard Carte
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Richard Carte (23 February 1808 – 1891) was an English flute-maker, flautist and composer.
Life
Carte was born in Silchester, Hampshire. He studied with George Rudall on an eight key 'Nicholson' flute. By 1824 he was giving regular concerts in London both as soloist and orchestra player. He married the former Eliza Jones (1814–1885); they had eloped, to the disappointment of her father, Thomas Jones, a clergyman. Two of his six children, Henry W. Carte (1856–1926) and Richard D'Oyly Carte, were both to became important in their own fields: the first as flute-maker and the second for staging the Gilbert and Sullivan comic operas.[1] The other children were Blanch (1846–1935), Viola (1848–1925), Rose (born 1854) and Eliza (1860–1941).[2]
Richard Carte was a popular lecturer on the development of the flute and was secretary of the newly founded 'London Society of Amateur Flautist' in 1866. He was friend of Louis Spohr, and in 1843 was a member of Jullien's famous band. At the height of his career (1844) he adopted Theobald Boehm's flute with the open G-sharp, and two year later brought out a manual for it: the copyright for which he sold for £100. His best known flute pupil was Richard Shepherd Rockstro.
In 1850 he became a partner at the prominent flute-making firm of Rudall, Rose & Co., instigating many improvements and additions to Boehm's systems, all of which culminated in his popular 1867 model.[3] After he became a partner in the business, it changed its name to Rudall, Rose, Carte and Co. and later to Rudall, Carte & Co.[4]
Compositions
- 1845, 'Complete Instruction for the Boehm flute'
- Concertants Duets for two flutes
- Fantasias
- Grands Solos for flute and piano
Notes
- ↑ Young, pp. 98–99
- ↑ Jacobs, Arthur. "Carte, Richard D'Oyly (1844–1901)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, September 2004, accessed 12 September 2008, doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/32311
- ↑ Burgess, Michael. "Richard D'Oyly Carte", The Savoyard, January 1975, pp. 7–11
- ↑ "New Music", The Era, 21 March 1869. Rudall, Carte and Co was still trading in the West End in 1954: see The Times, 16 December 1954, p. 1
References
- Andrew Fairley, Flutes, Flautists and Makers, London 1982
- Young, Percy M. (1971). Sir Arthur Sullivan. London: Dent. ISBN 0-460-03934-2.