Het Utrechtse muziekcollege in de achttiende eeuw: Patriciaat en cultuurpolitiek tussen privaat en publiek

While the common conception is that music was a widespread pastime among the upper classes of the Dutch Republic, we still know little about music-making among the patriciate. This article sheds light on the central role of patricians in the eighteenth-century Utrecht collegium musicum. It shows that the many personal ties between the collegium and the Utrecht city council entailed an urban cultural politics in which the collegium was able to count on material and financial support for a long time. While this support contributed to the legitimisation of the collegium as a fashionable cultural society, the collegium was also supposed to enhance the city’s cultural prestige. With the opening of a council-funded concert hall in 1766, the mutual relations were put to the test, arising from a conflict between the collegium’s origin as a private elite society and the council’s vision for a public concert institution.