The Band That Played On Read online

  Six days later the Orchestral Association mounted a memorial concert for the musicians at London’s Royal Albert Hall. It featured a five-hundred-strong orchestra composed of members of London’s seven main orchestras—the Philharmonic, the Queen’s Hall, the London Symphony, the New Symphony, the Beecham Symphony, the Royal Opera, and the London Opera House. Conductors included Thomas Beecham, Henry Wood, and composer Edward Elgar. Ada Crossley, an Australian soprano, sang a solo.

  A century later the Titanic musicians’ story is still known, not through newspaper accounts or even history books but through the movies Titanic (1953), A Night to Remember (1958), and Titanic (1997). Titanic societies keep their names alive as do excellent Web sites such as www.encyclopedia-Titanica.org and www.Titanic-Titanic.com. In 1997 musician Ian Whitcomb recorded an album of tunes the band would have played and was nominated for a Grammy for his comprehensive sleeve notes. His musicians for the project were named the White Star Orchestra.

  Yet despite widespread recognition of the event, we appear to know as much about the musicians as was known in 1912. A book published that year had asked: “What about the bandsmen? Who were they? This question was asked again and again by all who read the story of the Titanic’s sinking and of how the brave musicians played to the last, keeping up the courage of those who were obliged to go down with the ship. Many efforts were made to find out who the men were, but little was made public.” Although because of the Internet it’s now much easier to retrieve contemporary accounts of the band’s actions, the members still remain a ghostly presence. The same photographs are used repetitively, the same rumors are circulated, and other than Wallace Hartley, who entered the Oxford Dictionary of British Biography in 2010, the band members remain anonymous early-twentieth-century figures.

  It’s not hard to determine why this is so. These were not famous performers who had given interviews, filled in questionnaires, and been profiled during their lifetimes. None of them had written songs providing insights into their concerns or even, as far as we know, made recordings. For the most part, whatever diaries and letters they may have left behind have been lost over the years. They were famous for their deaths, not their lives. As a result, we know a lot about how they spent their last moments on the Titanic, but almost nothing about how they came to be there.

  The Titanic sailed out of Southampton but was registered in Liverpool. It was from an office in Liverpool that they were hired, at a Liverpool outfitter that they had their bandsmen’s uniforms adapted for the White Star Line, and from Liverpool stations that most of them left for what promised to be the journey of a lifetime. And so it is to Liverpool that we have to return to start the search for the band that played on.

  2

  “THE WORLD’S

  GREATEST LINER.”

  It was from their third-floor office at 14 Castle Street, Liverpool, that two Manchester-born brothers, Charles William and Frederick Nixon Black, planned the Titanic’s music. We’ll never discover what guided their choices or how they approached each instrumentalist, but we know that they had hundreds of players on their books, that they had both played for professional orchestras, and that their task was to put together two impressive groups of musicians appropriate for a first-class passenger list drawn from the top echelon of European and American society.

  Gore’s Liverpool Directory showing C. W. & F. N. Black at 14 Castle Street.

  No one could have known that they would be sending the eight musicians to their deaths by booking them. After all, the Titanic was the newest, safest, and most prestigious ship on the seas. Evidence suggests that the musicians may have been enticed by an above-average fee, and the tips alone would have made the trip worth taking. They were contracted only for the maiden voyage. These men from comparatively modest homes would be mingling with some of the world’s richest and most powerful people in an ambience of unparalleled luxury on a voyage that would make history.

  The Blacks were to emerge as villains of the piece. The tragedy exposed their unfair business practices and lack of consideration for their employees’ welfare. The ire of the Amalgamated Musicians’ Union had already been aroused when the Blacks became sole agents for all the major shipping lines, and the fate of the Titanic players simply gave the union more ammunition. They also revealed themselves as either heartless, thoughtless, or both, by asking one father to pay up for his son’s outstanding tailoring bill. The garment that had been altered was the uniform he died in.

  Although the Blacks argued for their innocence in the press, they couldn’t shed the reputation of callousness. Three of the bereaved fathers took them to court, and the AMU continued to campaign against them, eventually advising musicians either to stay with the AMU and not work for the Blacks or to work for the Blacks and relinquish union membership. The brothers, in turn, tried to make amends by raising money for the dependents of the Titanic’s band and making a show of their good deeds.

  Whether it was because of their notoriety, or simply because agents weren’t part of polite society, the Black brothers lived and died almost without a trace. To Titanic historians they have simply been C. W. & F. N. Black, the name under which they traded. No one has ever fleshed them out or discovered a photograph of them. When they died within a year of each other in the 1940s, their passing wasn’t even noted in their local newspaper. Their archives, which would have been of such value to researchers, must have been destroyed when the company ceased trading during World War II. They were never interviewed about their crucial role in the Titanic story.

  Castle Street had always been close to Liverpool’s center of power. In medieval times it was the street that connected the castle with the market and the river with the Pool, an area where several waterways converged into a docking area for ships. In the late eighteenth century the present town hall was built at one end. In the first decade of the twentieth century, when the Blacks began renting their offices, it was within walking distance of the headquarters of two of the greatest shipping lines of the era: Cunard on Water Street and White Star on James Street. It was also close to the newly completed landmark Royal Liver Building at the Pierhead. All of the buildings in the area announced confidence, wealth, and dominion. On the ground floor of number 14 was the Bank of British West Africa and the vice consular office for Salvador.

  Albion House, also known as the White Star Building, Liverpool.

  Nineteenth-century British prime minister Benjamin Disraeli once described Liverpool as the Empire’s second city. Internationally it was beaten only by London in terms of the value of its sea trade. New York was third. In 1908 almost 26,000 vessels used the 418 acres of docks that spread along the Mersey. A significant proportion of its population— from the owners of boardinghouses and makers of rope to dockworkers, bar stewards, boatbuilders, and travel agents—were dependent on sea traffic. In 1906 the port listed 1,305 steamships and 914 sailing ships in its register.

  Castle Street, Liverpool, looking toward Town Hall. The Blacks’ former office was in the building on the left.

  While the port of London handled more cargo, Liverpool dealt with more passengers. Since 1825 almost 56 percent of all people leaving Britain had embarked at Liverpool, and a surge in numbers after 1905 pushed its share to over 60 percent. The bonanza came from a wave of emigration that was only halted by the outbreak of World War I.

  Most of these passengers were traveling to either America or Canada with a minority going to Australia, New Zealand, or the Caribbean. Liverpool had long established routes to New York, Boston, Baltimore, Galveston, New Orleans, Quebec, and Montreal, and it attracted passengers from mainland Europe who would travel by ferry to ports such as Hull on the east coast and then overland by train. Some of them had return tickets but the majority were emigrants. The Atlantic crossing was their bid for a better life and Liverpool was their last glimpse of England.

  Charles and Frederick Black were born into a working-class Manchester family—their father William was a carpenter and joiner
—and they and their sister Elizabeth learned music as children. Musical ability eased their entry into the newly emerging middle class. Frederick, whose main instrument was the oboe, studied at the Royal Manchester College of Music from January 1899 until July 1900. Between 1900 and 1904 he ran F. N. Black & Co., Musical Instrument Manufacturers and Importers, from the family home at 6 Stanley Street in the Fairview area of Liverpool. He started off selling strings, became sole agent for Becker’s violin and cello pegs, and then began selling reasonably priced violins.

  Charles, the older brother by ten years, was a professor of music by the age of eighteen and five years later joined the Halle Orchestra as a second violinist. In 1899 he was joined by Frederick, who became one of the orchestra’s four oboists, obviously able to do this job while operating his business from home. Elizabeth became a music teacher. Charles also doubled up as second violinist for the Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra.

  The Halle, Britain’s first fully professional orchestra, was founded in 1857 by German-born pianist and conductor Charles Halle. Based at the Free Trade Hall on Manchester’s Peter Street in Manchester, it consisted of more than one hundred musicians, and a separate Halle choir had almost four hundred voices. Each year the orchestra would do a season of twenty concerts in Manchester and tour throughout Britain.

  Another reason for the paucity of information on the Blacks is that they left no heirs. Neither of them married, and nor did their sisters. Florence died in 1905 at the age of thirty-four after a bout of influenza. Elizabeth lived until 1955 and left her estate to her solicitor. The closest living relatives are the granddaughters of a cousin, one of whom owns a faded and damaged photograph of a previously unidentified Black brother. The young man with a dark fitted coat and bow tie is holding a violin, proving him to be Charles, the older and more dominant brother.

  Charles Black posing with his violin.

  The studio portrait contains few clues about the man who created the Titanic’s band. Charles stares at the camera without a hint of expression. Because of fading it’s hard to tell whether he’s clean-shaven or has a very light, downy mustache. His hair is parted left of center, and his nose has a beaked tip. The bow tie and formal jacket suggest that this was taken when he was playing for the Liverpool Philharmonic and Halle orchestras. Twenty-five years ago, elderly musicians in Liverpool who had worked for him remembered him as Charlie Black, a small dapper man with a neat mustache, smart gray suits, and spectacles, who looked more like a bank manager than a music agent.1

  There are no known photos of Frederick Black. The only description of him comes from an army medical record six years after the Titanic voyage: five feet ten inches tall (taller than the national male average by three inches), 145 pounds, light-brown hair, gray eyes, and a fresh complexion. By then, although still a relatively young man, he had a perforated eardrum that impaired his hearing.

  Charles finished with both the Halle and the Liverpool Philharmonic in 1907 and between then and 1909 established the agency, describing himself as a “musical director” rather than a mere “music agent.” This suggests a more creative role involving assembling bands, choosing repertoire, and supplying music. A musician friend, Enos Green, became the Blacks’ London representative, working out of his home on Fordwych Road in West Hampstead.

  C. W. & F. N. Black became the sole agents for the Grand Central Hotel in Leeds; the Kardomah Café in Castle Street, Liverpool; and the Constant Spring Hotel in Jamaica. They claimed to be able to supply groups of between five and fifty musicians. The most lucrative side of their business was to come from the shipping lines, which all used professional bands on their major passenger routes. By 1912 they were booking musicians for American, Anchor, Booth, Cunard, Royal Mail, and White Star—lines that owned more than eighty vessels between them. Players in the employ of the Blacks were known in Liverpool as “Charlie’s navy.”

  Although the musicians on ships played stringed instruments and were often referred to as an orchestra, they were officially bandsmen under the direction of a bandmaster. In a rare interview from the period, John Carr, a musician on the White Star liner Celtic, explained: “It’s a mistake from the technical point of view to call a steamer’s orchestra a band. The term is a survival of the days when they really had a brass band on board. On all the big steamships now the music is given by men who are thorough masters of their instruments.”

  Initially music on ships was provided by musically competent passengers, later by crew members. Stewards in second class were routinely tested for musical skills. When bands were eventually recruited from outside, they made their income from tips, but by 1907 the first salaried professional orchestras appeared on ships such as the Aragon and Adriatic. A 1909 White Star Line brochure for the “big four”—the Adriatic, Baltic, Cedric, and Celtic—used music as a selling point: “The cheery surroundings of the lounge make it an ideal spot for casual conversation or for the leisurely after-dinner demitasse, and, with the ship’s own orchestra of professional musicians discoursing catchy airs in the main foyer of the steamer, just outside the lounge doors, a pleasant sense of camaraderie is certain to be developed between the passengers even though they hail from many corners of the globe.”

  Crew lists reveal the names of these often uncelebrated musicians who played their way around the world: people like Ernest Drakeford of Rotherham, Ellwand Moody of Bramley, Frederick Stent and Albert Felgate of Egremont on the Wirral. Some of the older musicians were in their late fifties. Some of the younger ones were barely out of their teens. Many would stay with a ship for months or even years, but others would flit from ship to ship and from line to line. On Mediterranean cruises two English musicians might, for example, leave the ship in Italy to be replaced by two Italians. It was the ideal job for travelers, adventurers, and those escaping domestic problems.

  The work was long and arduous. A band could be expected to play at lunchtime, during teatime, and then again in the restaurant at night, as well as rehearsing every day. They might also perform at church services, evening balls, and at special celebratory events, such as when a ship broke the speed record. A sixteen-page White Star Line music booklet of the period lists 341 numbered pieces ranging from overtures, waltzes, ragtime, and marches to sacred music, classical music, and operatic selections. It was an extensive repertoire and new hit songs would be added as the list was constantly updated. Passengers—each given a copy of the booklet—could call out the number of any tune, and the band would be expected to play it.

  The rewards of the job were the regularity of employment and the chance to travel. Musicians on regular transatlantic sailings would inevitably spend as much time in Boston and New York as they did in Liverpool and Southampton. They made friends in these cities, especially among fellow musicians, and were able to experience the music, theater, and art of America. As a result they became experienced and confident players able to turn their hands to anything from a Rossini opera to the latest music hall hit.

  The standard wage for a ship’s musician was £6 10s. 0d. a month (£6.50 in decimal currency)—slightly higher than that of a police constable but lower than that of a miner. Food and lodging were free, however, and there were tips and a monthly uniform allowance. As crew members, musicians were under the command of the captain and in the case of injury or death were covered by the Workmen’s Compensation Bill of 1906. If they handled their money well, it was possible to accumulate decent savings after a few years at sea.

  The Blacks were definitely servicing ships by 1909 and first appear in Gore’s Liverpool Directory for 1910.2 In August 1909, an Austrian bandsman on the Lusitania, Paul Schumann, gave the Black’s office address in Castle Street as his contact address. Yet at that time not every ship’s musician was a client of C. W. & F. N. Black. Musicians were free to deal directly with the lines or with individual bandleaders. This changed in the early part of 1912 when the brothers negotiated with the major shipping companies to become their exclusive music agents. A White Star repres
entative said the deal was “a contract to furnish an orchestra of five musicians for a fixed sum for each ship.” All future business would go through C. W. & F. N. Black.

  The Amalgamated Musicians’ Union in Britain reacted angrily on behalf of its members. Not only were the Blacks harming long-established relationships between musicians and ships, but they also used their power to cut wages by almost 40 percent and abolish the uniform allowance. Their contracts confusingly prohibited players from accepting tips while simultaneously stipulating that gratuities should be pooled and then distributed equally to each musician, except for the bandleader, who was to get a double portion. The Blacks must have known that the wage reduction made tips essential for the players.

  Black Bros. salary statement for musician Roger Bricoux.

  In March 1912 an AMU delegation traveled to Southampton, where the Olympic was in dock, to confront the White Star Line’s chairman, J. Bruce Ismay. Their case was as follows:

  While we admit that anyone who finds the musicians and the music for someone else is entitled to some recompense, we cannot for one moment agree that Messrs. Black or anyone else are entitled to anything like 50 per cent of the fee allowed them for each bandsman … The bandsmen should sign the ship’s articles, be paid their wages direct by the company and not through any agent, and sign off at the termination of any engagement.

  The ship’s articles were terms and conditions that gave the bandsmen all the privileges of a crew member. It cost one shilling a month to sign on. Ismay’s response to the AMU appeared spiteful. Instead of restoring the previous arrangements, he cut all direct employment ties between White Star and the musicians by removing them from the ship’s articles and requiring the Black agency to pay for their tickets as second-class passengers. They were now employees of C. W. & F. N. Black. Like any other White Star passenger, they would go through immigration controls at Ellis Island and be required to produce $50 to prove they were not destitute. Ismay appeared to be saying, “Look. It’s nothing to do with me. If you have problems with the wages, go and talk to the agency. We don’t set the pay thresholds.”