Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians

Home, Sweet Home

HOME, SWEET HOME. The words of this favourite English song were written by John Howard Payne, and the music is the of Sir Henry Bishop. About 1820 there was published by subscription through Messrs. Goulding & Co. a folio of work — Melodies of Various Nations with Symphonies and Accompaniments by Henry R. Bishop, the Words by Thomas Bayly, Esq., Author of Rough Sketches of Bath. This work, which afterwards ran through one of two periodical volumes, appears to have been a rival of Thomas Moore's National Airs published by Power from 1818 to 1828. The airs in both these works include Spanish, Portuguese, Turkish, etc. and it is very doubtful as to how far these are genuine. At the end of Melodies of Various Nations, is a set of verses by T. Haynes Bayly commencing:—

To the home of my childhood in sorrow I came,
And I fondly expected to find it the same, etc.

It will be noticed that this is ‘Home, Sweet Home’ without the characteristic refrain, and having some slight difference in melody. No notice appears to have been taken of the song and air in this form, and it was never republished.

When Bishop was writing the music for his opera ‘Clari, or The Maid of Milan,’ produced in May 1823, he took the supposed Sicilian melody, and adapted it to the two verses paraphrased by John Howard Payne from T. H. Bayly's earlier song.

In the theatre the lyric was sung by Miss Maria Tree, and it at once leaped into an extraordinary popularity. It was included as one of the items of the Birmingham Festival of that year, and was sung by Miss Kate Stephens in the second evening concert (Sept. 25) of the York Festival of 1823. ‘Home, Sweet Home’ now became a valuable copyright, and Goulding issued it as ‘composed’ by Bishop, who afterwards confessed to William Chappell and to others that he was the real author of the melody. Whatever may be its merits or demerits it has become the great ‘Home’ song of the English speaking people -- F. K. (Frank Kidson, Esq.)

Home, Sweet Home, Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians, Volume 2 edited by J. A. Fuller Maitland 1922.