The Child’s Introduction to Thorough Bass (1819)

At the end of the eighteenth century a new kind of women music teachers had begun to appear, rivalling the old-style music master, to serve the more affluent classes. Miss Dorothy Kilner was a well-established author of children'sbooks but also a musician. At this period, drawing-room pianists could find themselves called upon to accompany singers from an outline score with a figured bass. Subtitled ‘Conversations of a Fortnight’ Kilner’s book is addressed to ‘A Mother and her Daughter’ and claims to be the first English treatise on the subject addressed to children, in this case precocious young pianists. For later books of this kind see Rodwell (1836) and Fitton (1855), CTME 31and 33.