Music Stand

Gathering in the parlor to listen to music was a popular pastime during the nineteenth century. Prior to the advent of recorded sound, Americans relied on sheet music to play songs at home. This ebonized music stand in the fashionable style known as Neo-Grec (a style that embraced the geometry and decorative motifs of ancient Greek and Roman art) would have graced an elegant parlor or music room where family members and guests enjoyed musical soirées. Both a practical means of holding sheet music for singers and musicians and a marker of sophistication and good taste, the music stand was an essential feature in affluent middle- and upper-class homes throughout the United States. It evokes parlor songs of the day such as Stephen Foster’s Beautiful Dreamer (1864) and Henry Work’s My Grandfather’s Clock (1876).