This bibliography was first compiled by Don B. Wilmeth, Chair, Department of Theatre, Speech & Dance, Brown University. It has since been enlarged and updated by Derek B. Scott, Professor of Critical Musicology, University of Leeds, and Amy Hunsaker, Music & Performing Arts Librarian, University of Virginia, our current Music and Theatre editor.
Anderson, Jean, ed. Late Joys at The Players' Theatre. London: T.V. Boardman & Co., 1943.
Anstey, F., revised w/ introd. by C.L. Graves. The Young Reciter and Model Music-Hall. London: Methuen, 1931 (orig. in 2 vols., 1888 and 1890).
Anthony, Barry. Murder, Mayhem, and Music Hall: The Dark Side of Victorian London. London: I.B. Tauris & Co. Ltd., 2014.
Bailey, Peter. "Champagne Charlie: Performance and Ideology in the Music Hall Swell Song." In Jacqueline S. Bratton, ed., Music Hall: Performance and Style. Milton Keynes: Open University Press, 1986. 49–69.
Bailey, Peter. Leisure and Class in Victorian England: Rational Recreation and the Contest for Control, 1830–1885. London: Methuen, 1987. (Originally published by Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1978).
Bailey, Peter. Popular Culture and Performance in the Victorian City. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998.
Baker, Richard Anthony. Marie Lloyd: Queen of the Music-halls. London: Robert Hale, 1990.
Barker, Kathleen. Early Music Hall in Bristol. Bristol: Bristol Branch of the Historical Association, 1979.
Barker, Tony. Nelson Jackson. Mitcham, Surrey: T. Barker, 2001.
Beale, Sam. Comedy and Legacy of Music-Hall Women 1880-1920: Brazen Impudence and Boisterous Vulgarity. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2021.
Beeching, Christopher. The Heaviest of Swells: A Life and Times in the Music Halls: George Leybourne, 1842-1884, "Champagne Charlie." Crete, Greece: DCG Publications, 2011.
Billington, Michael. How Tickled I Am. A Celebration of Ken Dodd. London: Elm Tree, 1977.
Binder, Pearl. The Pearlies: A Social Record. London: Jupiter Books, 1975.
Booth, J.B. A Pink 'Un Remembers. London: T. Werner Laurie, 1937.
Brandreth, Gyles. The Funniest Man on Earth: The Story of Dan Leno. North Pomfret, VT: Hamish Hamilton, 1977.
Bratton, J.S. Wilton's Music Hall. (Guide to Slides). London: Consortium for Drama and Media in Higher Education, 1975.
Bratton, J.S., ed. Music Hall: Performance & Style. Milton Keynes/Philadelphia: Open UP, 1986.
Busby, Roy. British Music Hall: An Illustrated Who's Who from 1850 to the Present Day. London and New Hampshire: Paul Elek, 1976.
Calthrop, Dion Clayton. Music Hall Nights. London: John Lane the Bodley Head, 1925.
Cheshire, D.F. Music Hall in Britain. Newton Abbot: David & Charles, 1974.
Chester, Charlie. The Grand Order of Water Rats: A Legend of Laughter. London: W.W. Allen, 1984.
Coburn, Charles. "The Man Who Broke the Bank": Memories of the Stage & Music Hall. London: Hutchinson & CO., [1928].
Cotes, Peter. George Robey. London: Cassell, 1972.
Davison, Peter. Songs of the British Music Hall. NY: Oak Publications, 1971.
Disher, Maurice Willson. Victorian Song: From Dive to Drawing Room. London: Phoenix House, 1955.
Farson, Daniel. Marie Lloyd & Music Hall. London: Tom Stacey, 1972.
Faulk, Barry J. Music Hall and Modernity: Late Victorian Discovery of Popular Culture. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2014.
Felstead, S. Theodore. Stars Who Made the Halls. London: T. Werner Laurie, 1946.
Gammond, Peter. Your Own, Your Very Own! A Music Hall Scrapbook. London: Ian Allen, 1971.
Garrett, John M. Sixty Years of British Music Hall. London: Chappell & Co., 1976.
Gillies, Midge. Marie Lloyd: The One and Only. London: Orion, 2001.
Green, Benny, ed. The Last Empires: A Music Hall Companion. London: Pavilion Books, 1986.
Haill, Catherine. Victorian Illustrated Music Sheets. London: Her Majesty's Stationery Office,1981.
Hilliam, B.C. Flotsam's Follies. London: Arthur Barron, 1948.
Hindle, David, and Gary Morecambe. By Rail to the Music Halls. Horncastle, Lincolnshire: Mortons Books, 2020.
Höher, Dagmar. "The Composition of Music Hall Audiences." In Peter Bailey, ed., Music Hall: The Business of Pleasure. Milton Keynes: Open University Press, 1986. 73–92.
Honri, Peter. John Wilton's Music Hall: The Handsomest Room in Town. Hornchurch, Essex: Ian Henry, 1985.
Honri, Peter. Lions Comiques!. London: Greenwich Exchange, 2005.
Honri, Peter. Working the Halls. Farnborough, Hampshire: Saxon House, 1973.
Hudd, Roy. Music Hall. London: Eyre Methuen, 1976.
Hudd, Roy. Roy Hudd's Book of Music-Hall, Variety and Showbiz Anecdotes. London: Robson's Books, 1993.
Hudd, Roy, with Philip Hindin. Roy Hudd's Cavalcade of Variety Acts: A Who Was Who of Light Entertainment 1945-60. London: Robson Books, 1997.
Irving, Gordon. Great Scot! [Harry Lauder]. London: Leslie Frewin, 1968.
Kift, Dagmar. The Victorian Music Hall: Culture, Class and Conflict. Trans. Roy Kift. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996. (Originally published as Arbeiterkultur im gesellschaftlichen Konflikt: die englische Music Hall im 19. Jahrhundert. Essen: Klartext Verlag, 1991.)
Kilgarriff, Michael. It Give Me Great Pleasure. Production Guide and Chairman's Handbook for Old Time Music Hall. London: Samuel French, 1972.
Kilgarriff, Michael. Grace, Beauty and Banjos: Peculiar Lives and Strange Times of Music Hall and Variety Artistes. London: Oberon Books, 1998.
Le Roy, George. Music Hall Stars of the Nineties. London: British Technical and General Press, 1952.
Leno, Dan. Hys Booke by Himself. Intro. by Roy Hudd. London: Hugh Evelyn, 1968.
Leslie, Peter. A Hard Act to Follow: A Music Hall Review. NY & London: Paddington Press, 1978.
Macqueen-Pope, W. The Melodies Linger On: The Story of Music Hall. London: W.H. Allen, nd.
MacInnes, Colin. Sweet Saturday Night. Pop Song 1840-1920. London: MacGibbon & Kee, 1967.
Maitland, Sara. Vesta Tilley. London: Virgo Press, 1986.
Mander, Raymond and Joe Mitchenson. British Music Hall. Rev. London: Gentry Books, 1974.
Marshall, Michael, ed. The Stanley Holloway Monologues. London: Elm Tree, 1979.
McQueen-Pope, W. Marie Lloyd: Queen of the Music Halls. London: Oldbourne, nd.
Mellor, G.J. The Northern Music Hall. Newcastle: Frank Graham, 1970.
Mellor, Geoff J. They Made Us Laugh: A Compendium of Comedians Whose Memories Remain Alive. Littleborough, Lancashire: George Kelsall, 1982.
Minutes of Evidence. Taken before the Select Committee on Theatres and Places of Entertainment. London: Eyre & Spottiswoode for HMSO, 1892.
Newton, H. Chance. Idols of the 'Halls' Being My Music-Hall Memories. London: Heath Cranton, 1928.
Nown, Graham. When the World Was Young: A Companion Volume to the Granada TV Serial LOST EMPIRES. London: Ward Lock Ltd, 1986.
Nuttall, Jeff. King Twist: A Portrait of Frank Randle. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1978.
Pennybacker, Susan. 1986. "'It was not what she said, but the way in which she said it': The London County Council and the Music Hall." In Peter Bailey, ed., Music Hall: The Business of Pleasure. Milton Keynes: Open University Press. 118–40.
Powell, W. W., and P. J. Di Maggio, eds. 1991. The New Institutionalism in Organizational Analysis. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Pulling, Christopher. They were Singing And what they sang about. London: George G. Harrap, 1952.
Read, Jack. Empires, Hippodromes & Palaces. London: The Alderman Press, 1985.
Reeve, Ada. Take It for a Fact. London: William Heinemann, 1954.
Roberts, Arthur. Fifty Years of Spoof. London: John Lane the Bodley Head, 1927.
Rose, Clarkson. Red Plush and Greasepaint. A Memory of the Music-Hall and Life and Times from the Nineties to the Sixties. London: Museum Press, 1964.
Russell, D. "Varieties of Life: The Making of the Edwardian Music Hall." In M. R. Booth and J. H. Kaplan, eds, The Edwardian Theatre: Essays on Performance and the Stage. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996. 61–85.
Scheide, Frank M. Chaplin's "Limelight" and the Music Hall Tradition. Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland, 2006.
Scott, Harold. The Early Doors: Origins of the Music Hall. London: Nicholson & Watson, 1946. Reprint. East Ardsley, Wakefield: EP Publishing, 1977.
Richard W. Scott. Institutions and Organizations: Ideas, Interests, and Identities. 4th ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2014.
Senelick, Laurence, David F. Cheshire, and Ulrich Schneider. British Music-Hall 1840-1923: A Bibliography and Guide to Sources with a Supplement on European Music-Hall. Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1981.
Sheridan, Paul. Late and Early Joys at the Players Theatre. London: T.V. Boardman, 1952.
Short, Ernest Henry and Arthur Compton-Rickett. Ring Up the Curtain, Being a Pageant of English Entertainment Covering Half a Century. 1938. Reprint. Freeport, NY: Books for Libraries Press, 1970.
Short, Ernest. Fifty Years of Vaudeville. London: Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1946.
Short, E. Sixty Years of Theatre. London: Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1951.
Speaight, George. Bawdy Songs of the Early Music Hall. Newton Abbot: David & Charles, 1975.
Stokes, John. In the Nineties (Chapter: "'Prudes on the Prowl': The view from the Empire Promenade"). Chicago: U. of Chicago Press, 1989.
Sudworth, Gwynedd. The Great Little Tilley: Vesta Tilley and Her Times. Luton: Cortney Publications, 1984.
Tich, Mary and Richard Findlater. Little Tich: Giant of the Music Hall. North Pomfret, VT: Hamish Hamilton, 1979.
Wilmut, Roger. Kindly Leave the Stage! The Story of Variety 1919-1960. London: Methuen, 1985.
Wilson, A.E. Prime Minister of Mirth. The Biography of Sir George Robey, C.B.E. London: Odhams Press, 1956.
Wood, Georgie. Royalty, Religion and Rats. Burnley, Lancashire: Central Printing, 1963?
Woods, Leigh. Transatlantic Stage Stars in Vaudeville and Variety: Celebrity Turns. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006.
Other Bibliographies
Created 9 October 2005
Last modified 20 May 2018