Report by Duncan Williams for Pulman's Weekly News
Jane Austen’s love of music, and the important role it played in her life and writing, will be explored at a special lecture-recital in Crewkerne on 10th September 2026.
Australian scholar, author, singer and pianist Dr Gillian Dooley will visit the South Somerset Music Centre to present Jane Austen Played and Sang, an illustrated talk exploring the music Austen knew, enjoyed and performed.
Drawing on Austen’s surviving music collection, family records and letters, Dr Dooley will trace the place of music in the novelist’s life from her teenage years through to her final years.
The presentation will combine scholarship with live performances of songs and piano works drawn from Austen’s own repertoire. The music will be played on a square piano of a similar vintage to the instrument Austen herself would have known.
Although Austen is celebrated throughout the world for novels such as Pride and Prejudice, Emma and Sense and Sensibility, her enthusiasm for music is less widely known.
Austen was an enthusiastic amateur musician who regularly practised the piano and sang. Music also features in her novels, where it can help illuminate the personalities, relationships and social lives of her characters.
Dr Dooley is an Honorary Associate Professor in English Literature at Flinders University in South Australia. Her research and writing bring together literature, music and history, and she has published and presented internationally on Jane Austen.
She is the author of She Played and Sang: Jane Austen and Music, published by Manchester University Press in 2024. The book was named a CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title for 2024 and draws on extensive research into surviving music books belonging to the Austen family.
It also explores the connections between Austen’s musical life and her writing, offering an insight into an aspect of the novelist’s world that is often overlooked.
The Crewkerne event will combine academic research with live performance, offering an opportunity for audiences to discover a different side of one of Britain’s best-loved writers while experiencing some of the music that formed part of her life.
No specialist knowledge is required, with the event aimed at anyone interested in Jane Austen, music, literature or social history.
Jane Austen Played and Sang takes place at South Somerset Music Centre, The Methodist School Room, South Street, Crewkerne, TA18 8DB, from 7.00pm to 8.00pm on Thursday, 10th September 2026.
Tickets cost £10, plus a 25p ticket service fee, and can be booked through the South Somerset Music Centre website: http://southsomersetmusiccentre.co.uk
( Images courtesy of SMC 📸 )