Royal College of Music

A meeting convened by the Prince of Wales at Marlborough House in 1878 had proposed to amalgamate the Royal Academy of Music and the National Training School for Music into a new national music conservatoire, and a charter was drafted. Following the failure of the RAM to enter the scheme, a new charter was drafted in 1880, which proposed particularly that the new Royal College of Music should raise funds to provide for the maintenance as well as the education of certain of its students. The Prince of Wales accepted the presidency of the College's Council, and George Grove became a member of the Council and Executive Committee in July 1881. The draft charter for the proposed Royal College of Music of 1880 had provided for a Council to be the governing body of the College, constituted of three ex-officio members (the President, Principal and Vice-Principal) and thirty other ordinary members. However from 1883 until 1970, the Director sat 'in attendance' with the Council and was not an ex-officio member. Thereafter the Director and other staff were eligible to be appointed Council members, and this was extended in 1975 to include three additional members of staff appointed by the Board of Professors. The President of the Council (normally a royal personage) was also Chairman of the Council between 1882-1965. Thereafter the Chair has been held as follows: Rt Hon Lord Redcliffe Maud, 1965-1972; Col the Hon Sir Gordon Palmer, 1973-1987; Leopold de Rothschild, 1987-1999; Sir Anthony Cleaver, 1999-. The Presidency of the Council has been held as follows: Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, 1882-1901; George, Prince of Wales, 1901-1910; Prince Christian of Schleswig-Holstein, 1910-1918; Edward, Prince of Wales, 1918-1936; George, Duke of Kent, 1936-1942; Princess Elizabeth, 1943-1952; Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother, 1952-1992; Charles, Prince of Wales, 1993-.
The Executive and Finance Committees were originally separate entities from creation in 1883, but merged in May 1884. A Finance Committee met separately from the Executive Committee, Mar 1923-Feb 1939, having been instructed by the Council to 'to consider the present system of College finance with a view to the production of a duly audited balance sheet, and to a clearer presentment of the money...for ordinary expenditure'. The Executive and Finance Committee last met in 1991 and it was thereafter reconstituted as the Executive Committee.
The RCM Ladies and Visiting Committee was formed to liaise between the Executive Committee and the Superintendent of the Pupils' board houses on the one hand, and the students living in private houses.
The Building Committee's main business from 1981 was to oversee the construction of the Britten Opera Theatre, alterations to the Library, the Dining Room and Students' Recreation Room.
Ernest Palmer (later 1st Baron Palmer of Reading) endowed the 'Royal College of Music Patron's Fund' with £20,000 in 1903 for 'the encouragement of native composers by the performance of their works'. The first use of the funds was to give public concerts of new chamber and orchestral works from 1904. In 1925, he supplemented his Patron's Fund with a Fund for Opera Study, as well as contributions to the fabric of the building.