Novello & Company
Novello & Company
Although Vincent Novello began publishing editions of church music under his own name in 1811, the company did not operate until 1829, administered from offices in London by his son Joseph Alfred. From there it grew rapidly, establishing a virtual monopoly in low-cost mass sales of choral music, bringing to the English-speaking world performing editions of Bach, Handel, Haydn and Mendelssohn and a multitude of contemporaries, later publishing individual choral works by Dvorák, Gounod and Saint-Saëns.
The Novellos had scholarly aspirations, instituting the Purcell Edition in 1832 and buying The Musical Times in 1844, the first of a number of influential periodicals they were eventually to publish. Educational publishing remained an important part of the catalogue throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Elgar was the first internationally acknowledged composer signed to Novello, followed by Bliss, Dyson, Holst, Howells and Moeran. From the 1970s, the list increased, with important signings like R.R. Bennett, Bush, Frankel, Horovitz, Joubert, Leighton, McCabe and Musgrave. Novello bought Elkin & Co in 1961 bringing Scott and Quilter works to the catalogue, and the purchase of Paterson’s Publications in 1989 contributed many works by Malcolm Arnold. Novello joined the Music Sales Group in 1993 and maintains its historic role as both major choral publisher and purveyor of new music.