Beecham's music portfolio / Thomas Beecham.

These appear to be cheap (price twopence) paperback reprint collections of the songs which were originally issued by Beecham (possibly in the 1890s) as highly popular single, folded song sheets under the same series name: 'Beecham's music portfolio'. We have many in the Ephemera collection in two boxes called: Drug advertising ephemera, box 14 - EPH288 and Drug advertising ephemera, box 15 - EPH289. Each sheet was printed in brown and had a generic cover of a woman playing a piano with a man standing at her side about to sing. Pages 2 and 3 contained the music and words. The back cover was a full page advertisement for one of Beecham's products (these changed from one sheet to the next). The cover illustration was updated (fashions change) and later ones were printed in black (as is this collected volume). There were leather and clothbound reprints of the songs and also these much cheaper paperbacks. Every volume contains 30 popular songs with music for voice and piano and there were at least 10 of them. They may well have been reprinted on a regular basis. The back cover advertises Beecham's Pills ("for all bilious and nervous disorders... constipation... impaired digestion, disordered liver & female ailments").