| Main Performers | Architectural Society,
Central School,
Royal Academy of Art,
Royal College of Art,
Slade School of Art,
Westminster School of Art,
Sheikh Iftekhar Rasool,
St.Martin's School of Art,
Chelsea School of Art,
Architectural Association,
Clapham School of Art |
| Orchestra or Band | London Scottish Pipers and Drummers,
Clabon-West Orchestra,
Clabon-West Band,
The Rovers,
The Embassy Band |
| Conductors | P S Clabon-Glover,
Jack Harris |
| Set List | Fox-Trot: 'Happy Feet',
Fox-Trot: 'A Girl Friend of a Boy Friend Of Mine',
Fox-Trot: 'Song of The Dawn',
Fox-Trot: 'Sing a Happy Little Thing',
Waltz: 'It Happened in Monterey',
Waltz: 'Dancing With Tears in My Eyes',
Fox-Trot: 'Two of Everything',
Fox-Trot: 'It Must Be You',
Fox-Trot: 'Good Evening',
Fox-Trot: 'My Bluebird was Caught in The Rain',
Fox-Trot: 'It Seems to be Spring',
Fox-Trot: 'I've Gotta Yen For You',
Fox-Trot: 'Hittin' The Bottle',
Fox-Trot: 'Here Comes The Sun'
Birthday Candles (Architectural Society)
Stomp: 'That Lindy Hop',
Fast Fox-Trot: 'Sweet Jenny Lee'
Wine (Central School),
Cakes (Royal Academy),
Fruit (Royal College of Art),
Presentation at Court (Slade School),
Cousins From Kenya (Westminster School),
Friends From Asia (Sheikh Iftekhar Rasool)
Fox-Trot: 'Cheer Up, Good Times are Coming',
Fox-Trot: 'I'll be Thinking of You',
Fox-Trot: 'He Dances on the Ceiling',
Fox-Trot: 'Nobody Cares if I'm Blue'
Coming Out (St. Martin's School of Art),
Fox-Trot: 'Livin' in the Sunlight-Lovin' in the Moonlight',
Fox-Trot: 'You Brought a New Kind of Love to Me'
Chelsea China (Chelsea School of Art)
Waltz: 'Blue Danube',
Waltz: 'Women-Wine-Song'
'Some Cracker' (Architectural Association)
Fox-Trot: 'Go Home and Tell Your Mother',
Fox-Trot: 'My Secret Passion'
'An Aeroplane Party' (Clapham School),
Fox-Trot: 'Great Day',
Fox-Trot: 'Sing Something Simple',
Waltz: 'The Same as We Used to Do',
Waltz: 'Some Day I'll Find You',
Fox-Trot: 'I'm Yours',
Fox-Trot: 'The King's Horses',
Fox-Trot: 'Still Get a Thrill',
Fox-Trot: 'Cheerful Little Earful',
Fox-Trot: 'Bye-Bye Blues',
Fox-Trot: 'Little White Lies',
Waltz: 'So This is Love',
Fox-Trot: 'Reminiscing',
Fox-Trot: 'Elizabeth',
Fox-Trot: 'Great Day',
Stomp: 'Hulaballoo',
Fast Fox-Trot: 'Let's Go Native',
Fox-Trot: 'O Donna Clara',
Fox-Trot: 'A Little Love Song',
Waltz: 'The Kiss Waltz',
Waltz: 'All Through The Night',
Fox-Trot: 'Swinging in a Hammock',
Fox-Trot: 'Tiddle-Iddle-Um-Pum',
Fox-Trot: 'My Desire',
Fox-Trot: 'Watching My Dreams Go By',
Fox-Trot: 'Confessin',
Fox-Trot: 'I Have No Words',
'God Save the King' (The National Anthem) |
| Performance Notes | Ticketed ball organised by the Chelsea Arts Club, based in London, with the theme of 'Coming of Age'. Decorations were designed by Dean Cornell and Frank Brangwyn RA. A nine foot high birthday cake with a 24 foot high bottle of campagne were the centrepieces, the letter was 'opened' at midnight.
Associated Press Archive holds B&W British Movietone footage of the event (BM1004).
"NEW YEAR REVELS.
CHELSEA ARTS BALL COMES OF AGE.
Four thousand dancers, in a brilliant fantasy of light and colour, saw the New Year in last night at the Albert Hall, where the Chelsea Arts Club Ball celebrated its coming of age.
There is something deliciously, anonymously irresponsible about fancy dress, and the spirit of the evening was distinctly for laying aside the solemnities of everyday life. What formality remains, when lawyer dances with pirate, Spanish grandee with Parisian gamine, or Rameses II with Columbine? Many of the costumes were gorgeously elaborate, and very few of the men were cowards enough to fall back on the Venetian cloaks provided for the dancers who required them to confirm to the one regulation of the night.
The decorations, for which Mr Frank Brangwyn and Mr Dean Cornwall, the American decorative artist who was his pupil, were responsible, were in themselves gargantuan incitements to gaiety.
At the back of the hall, reaching from the floor to the dome, stood the "Spirit of Youth," a wineglass in either hand, against an enormous expanse of luminous blue, Card and dice hung from the roof and bulging balloon carriers.
As a centrepiece, 33ft in circumference, stood the birthday cake, surmounted by a super-magnum of champagne 24ft high.
At a few minutes to midnight the pageantry began. Twenty-one candles, each as high as three men, led the procession to group themselves about the cake. At midnight the enormous bottle was opened and Auld Lang Syne, inevitably and incongruously and delightfully as ever, filled the hall."
(The Daily Telegraph, 1 January 1931)
"TOO MUCH FUN.
Rowdy tendencies were again unpleasantly manifest at the Chelsea Arts Ball on New Year's Eve. There were several incipiently dangerous rushes and crowd jams, particularly when the giant champagne bottle and other properties were being removed at the close of the pageant.
Women were forced to climb into the boxes to escape being crushed, while the debris littering the floor hindered and dirtied the dancers subsequantly. There were other vapid follies, such as the case of a man who splashed champagne down from an upper box on to the dancers, while too boisterous revellers developed a prank of pulling off ladies' hats and wigs.
It was good to see that on several occassions they were driven off by a hard punch from the male escort. There were certainly far too many present who could not "hold their liquor," and perhaps the supreme folly was when two of these were heard discussing the idea of raising a cry of "Fire" - without thought of the terrible catastrophe which would probably have been caused.
Unless measures are taken to curtail this sort of licence the popularity of the ball may be endangered, for, apart from a small section of studets, people see no fun in the staining and tearing of costly dresses or in the frightening of their wearers."
(The Daily Telegraph, 2 January 1931)
Founded in 1891 The Chelsea Arts Club is a members club for artists, which for 50 years from 1908 held an annual costumed New Year's Eve ball, which was an infamous part of London's social calendar. After two years at the Royal Opera House the extravagant ball proved so popular it moved to the Royal Albert Hall where it stayed until 1958. The balls attracted media attention with their lavish theatrical sets, multiple orchestras, raucous midnight carnivals and balloon drops and crowds of up to 10,000 socialites, bohemian artists, actors, and ordinary Londoners in elaborate and often scandalous fancy dress dancing until 5am.
Each year a theme was chosen such as Egyptian, Dazzle, Noah's Ark, Prehistoric and Sun Worship around which guests could create flamboyant costumes. London art schools participated by decorating huge carnival floats, which were driven around the auditorium floor and which, at the stroke of midnight, would be destroyed by revellers. The balls were well-known for reports of public nudity, drunken displays of affection, fighting and unadulterated fun. In the vastness of the Hall with its gas lit corridors, curtained boxes and dark staircases naughtiness was the order of the day.
Similarly to the annual Lady Malcolm's Servant's balls (1930-1938) these events were a safe space for the queer community to meet and express themselves with unbridled creativity and little inhibition. There were no scrutineers denying entry or undercover police. LGBTQ+ party goers could feel (relatively) free to be themselves without the scrutiny and surveillance they underwent in their daily lives. For many men especially they could wear drag, dress outrageously, and socialise unashamedly while never appearing to be anything out of the ordinary.
It was New Year's Eve 1958 that was to be the final Chelsea Arts Ball at the Royal Albert Hall. As well as minor damage to the building fabric, a partygoer dispatched a smoke bomb that exploded on the dance floor and ultimately became the straw that broke the camel's back. The Chelsea Arts Ball was asked to take out insurance indemnity against further damage to the Hall and they didn't return. The Ball has returned three times since - in 1984, 1985 and 1992 - although the elaborate costumes and floats didn't make the return trip. The extravagant, eccentric originals remain part of the history of the Capital's social calendar. |
| Related Archival Material | Programme (RAHE/1/1930/94) |