a: INTRODUCTION 9 
Z _ Even as the Blackfriars and the other private theatres were | 
beginning to make their influence felt, the old public theatre- 
4 3 structures were beginning to pass out of existence into history.” 
_ On the other hand, “public” performances soon took possession 
of the private theatres. Consequently, the invidious distinction 
of “public” and “private” theatres set up by Elizabeth in 1597 
- was lost sight of within the next generation. Salisbury Court 
theatre, built in 1629, was the last of the “private” sort. All the- 
atres of later date* were “public” but with the chief features of 
the original “private”? house of the Blackfriars, while “private” 
_ theatres reverted to what they had previously been and what they 
still are today,—merely a temporary room or hall for occasional 
_ or amateur acting... The new Globe was built 1614, and the new 
Fortune, 1622. These were the last “public” theatres of the old 
architecture. All theatres from that time to the present have 
been modeled on the general plan of the private theatres as first 
established at Blackfriars.‘ 
Likewise our modern orchestral praeludium, corresponding to 
the Chapel Children’s introductory “musica instrumentalis” at 
Blackfriars, as also our present orchestral interludia between acts 
and scenes, corresponding to the intermezzos of various sorts of 
musical instruments by the same Boys, can be traced directly to 
them and not to the public theatres. The latter had at the close 
of Elizabeth and beginning of James almost no music. In the 
plays of all the children-companies music is a prominent part of 
the performance,—more at Blackfriars and Paul’s under Eliza- 
beth, as noted before, than at the same or other theatres under 
James. : 
Music was always one of the distinguishing features of the 
private houses of the children-companies. Their plays even as 
‘ *Blackfriars (1597—Aug. 6, beth—after 1663); Globe (1599— 
- 1655); Paul’s (1598— ?); White- April 15, 1644); Fortune, (1600- 
friars (ca. 1603 — ca. 1621); Cock- 49); Bear Garden ( ?— 1613); 
a MT i at a oo 
“ ae, 
_ pit ( ?—March 24, 1649); Salis- Hope (1613—25 March, 1656). 
_ bury Court (1629—-—; after the For certain terminal dates in this 
: Restoration). and the preceding note, see docu- 
*The Theatre (1576-98); Cur- ment communicated in a letter by 
tain (1577 — early James I); New- F. J. Furnivall, The End of Shake- 
ington Butts ( ?—early James I); speare’s Theatres, in The Academy 
Rose (1592—not used as playhouse (1882), xxii, 214-15. 
after 1603) ; Swan (ca. 1596 — early 57.e., after the Restoration. 
: James I); Red Bull (ca. late Eliza- “Cf. infra, 18°, 37-54. 
123 
} 
(“aa 
