Sydney, Harry

Harry Sydney (1825 -1870) was a major figure in the early Music Halls. He was a regular attraction at Evans’s Song and Supper Rooms in the 1850s, and was one of the first major attractions at Charles Morton’s Oxford music Hall when it opened in 1861. He was best known for singing topical, sometimes political, songs many of which were never printed as sheet music. He was the resident singer at Sam Collins’ Music Hall in the mid-1860s and took over as chairman when Collins died in 1865. He wrote the lyrics for most of his own songs, sometimes the music was composed by a collaborator, but more often he adopted music from already well-known songs.