The 1769 Song That Invented Stan Culture

0:00You're listening to a podcast right now, driving, working out, walking the dog. If you're into podcasts, chances are you have something to say too. With RSS.com, starting your own is free and easy. Upload an episode, and we distribute it to Apple podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, and hundreds more. Track your listeners, see where they're from, and start earning from ads like this. Even with just 10 listeners a month. If you've been thinking about starting a podcast, this is your sign. Start free at RSS.com. Imagine like thousands of screaming fans, right? Traveling across the country, just totally obsessing over every single word written by their idol. Oh, absolutely. Buying up all the merchandise too. Yes. Buying the merch, defending their favorite creator against any critics, and you know, treating a completely ordinary hometown like its literal holy ground. Which sounds exactly like modern stand culture. Exactly. When I say that, you are probably picturing internet message boards or pop star stadium

1:04tours or maybe massive sci-fi conventions. Yeah. That's where the mind goes. But what if I told you the blueprint for this kind of intense, massive, almost hysterical fandom wasn't invented on the internet? It's a wild thought. It really is. What if I told you the exact architectural machinery for how we obsess over culture today was engineered in 1769 by a guy who wrote a gentle acoustic song about a river? It sounds like a stretch, I know, but it is entirely accurate. We have this tendency to view all-consuming fandom as this uniquely modern phenomenon, you know, maybe dating back to the boy bands of the mid-20th century or the rise of social media. Right. We think we invented it. Exactly. But the mechanics, the way you take a piece of entertainment and elevate it into a full blonde lifestyle, those were actually mapped out centuries ago. And today for our deep dive, we are looking at the exact artifact that proves it. We are. It's a single, extremely brief, Wikipedia entry about an 18th century piece of music

2:06called Softflowing Avon. Such an unassuming title, too. Totally. And while you, the listener, might be bracing yourself for a dry, dusty, history lesson about classical sheet music, you are actually about to hear the origin story of modern mega fandom. It really is the ground zero for it. Our mission today is to uncover how this one specific song from the year 1769 encapsulates a massive, tectonic shift in popular culture. Okay, let's unpack this. Let's do it. We need to start with the event itself. Right. And the absolute powerhouses who put it together. Because this wasn't just like some local tavern talent show. Oh, far from it. Yeah. The creation of Softflowing Avon was a highly orchestrated cultural event. Yeah. Have this song written in 1769 with the music composed by Thomas Arne and the lyrics penned by David Garrick? Right. And they didn't just write this for fun on a weekend. They created this piece, specifically for and debuted it at the Shakespeare Jubilee in Stratford, upon Avon. Now to put this in perspective, for anyone not familiar with the 18th century British

3:09theater, Arne and Garrick teaming up is not a casual collaboration. Not at all. Imagine two of the absolute biggest modern music and entertainment superstars teaming up today. Yeah. Like the biggest names you can think of. Right. But instead of collaborating for a massive global stadium tour and, you know, major capitals, they decide to headline a dedicated, hyper-specific tribute festival in a small rural hometown. It's a fascinating choice. It is because Stratford upon Avon is famously the birthplace of William Shakespeare. But holding a Jubilee there, that word carries weight, doesn't it? It carries an immense amount of weight. Historically, a Jubilee implies something almost sacred. Okay. Wow. Yeah. It's a term usually reserved for royal anniversaries or profound religious milestones. It implies a moment of grand societal reverence. Right. So by labeling this event a Jubilee and staging it in the very physical space where Shakespeare was born, Garrick and Arne aren't just throwing a party.

4:12No. Exactly. They were making a very calculated geographic claim. They were telling the public that Shakespeare's birthplace wasn't just a town on a map where a playwright happened to grow up. It was a site of cultural pilgrimage. It's the 18th century equivalent of creating a mecca for literature lovers. Which is incredible. You don't just read the plays anymore. You must physically travel to the soil where the genius was forged. Which is such a massive flex when you think about it. You are taking a playwright. A guy whose literal job was to write commercial entertainment for the rowdy masses and elevating his hometown to the status of a holy site. It's a complete paradigm shift. But hold on. This brings me to a huge question I have about the music itself. Because if you look at the composer, Thomas Arne, his involvement here feels, honestly, it feels completely mismatched when you look at his resume. Well, his catalog is certainly intimidating to say the least. I'm looking at his catalog right here and I am trying to wrap my head around his involvement.

5:12It's not just a few operas. He did comis in 1738. A major foundational work. Right. And then he does Alfred in 1740, Eliza in 1754, Thomas and Sally in 1760. The output is staggering. Wait. In 1762 alone, he drops both artiseric season love in a village in the same year. He was incredibly prolific and you have to understand these aren't small intimate chamber pieces. These are grand, sweeping epic theatrical events. They require massive staging, complex vocal arrangements and serious dramatic weight. And he doesn't stop. Later he does the fairy prints in 1771 and the Cooper in 1772. But here is the absolute kicker for me. Oh, I know where you're going with this. In 1740, this is the exact same composer who wrote rule Britannia. Are you believe one of the most famous chess thumping nationalistic anthems in British history? It is the heavyweight champion of imperial anthems. It is huge. It is loud.

6:13It is literally about dominating the oceans and ruling the waves. It is the sound of an empire. So what does this all mean? Why would a composer who spends decades writing these massive world conquering national anthems and a slew of epic mythological operas suddenly pivot to writing soft, flowing abon? It does seem like a stark contrast. Because if you look at the source, the lyrics to the 1769 song are just, you know, a gentle tribute to the local river flowing through Stratford. It is entirely localized and pastoral, yes. But doesn't that risk making the whole event look ridiculous? Have you been? I mean, if Hans Zimmer suddenly shows up to score a local high school play, people don't think the play is suddenly a Hollywood blockbuster. They just think Hans Zimmer lost a bet. That's a great analogy. Right. It feels like the guy who composed a national anthem is suddenly dropping an acoustic indie track about a local creek. How did Arn pull this off without it feeling like a massive mismatch? Well, what's fascinating here is the psychological weight of that exact contrast. Okay. You have to look at what happens when you apply high art, opera level composition to a highly

7:17localized geographical tribute. Arn wasn't stepping down to write a simple folk song. He was bringing the full undeniable prestige of his operatic background to the river Avon. Wait, slow down. So you're saying he didn't adjust his status to fit the river, he forced the river to fit his status? Precisely. By having the composer rural Britannia write the music for this Jubilee, the organizers instantly gave the event profound national importance. Think about the messaging. We aren't just bringing a local fiddler to play a tune about a local boy. We are bringing the architect of the British Imperial Sound to consecrate this water. That is wild. The signal to the entire country that the river Avon and by extension William Shakespeare's legacy was just as important, just as majestic as the grand mythological subjects of Arn's operas or even the British Empire itself. That is a brilliant piece of PR. It completely bypasses logic and goes straight for the emotions. It really does. It's like saying we aren't celebrating a guy who wrote some plays, we are celebrating

8:19a national deity and we hired the guy who writes music for empires to prove it. And when you successfully engineer the creation of a cultural deity, the worship of that deity cannot be contained to a small rural town. Obviously not. The prestige was simply too great and frankly too profitable. It had to expand. And it absolutely did because according to the sources, this little song didn't stay in Stratford upon Avon. No, it didn't. Soft flowing Avon eventually packed its bags and made its way to the big city. It became a key part of the Shakespeare pageant which was performed at the jury-length theater in London, which represents a monumental shift in the lifespan and function of this song. It really is. Moving from the Stratford Jubilee to the jury-length theater is essentially like taking a cool grassroots indie arts festival held out in the woods and adapting it into a massive Broadway spectacle in Times Square. That's exactly the scale we're talking about. You are taking a site-specific tribute, a song literally written about the specific river in Shakespeare's hometown and performing it for a massive metropolitan audience who,

9:24let's be honest, may never have even seen that river in their lives. What you are seeing here is the commodification of an aesthetic. Okay. Say more about that. They took the pastoral and most mythical essence of Shakespeare's origins and packaged it for mass consumption on the largest theatrical stage available. Okay. Translate that for me. I mean, they took the muddy physical reality of this rural river, cleaned it up, slapped a ticket price on it, and sold the vibe to wealthy Londoners who just wanted to feel connected to the countryside. That is exactly what they did. The London audience didn't need this step foot in the mud of Stratford upon Avon. Right. They could sit in a plush velvet chair at Drury Lane, listened to Thomas Arne's glorious high art composition and feel the exact same religious reverence for Shakespeare's hometown. The song acted as a bridge. And here's where it gets really interesting. Our source material explicitly points out that this song and the Jubilee itself were key parts of a growing 18th century culture known as Bardolatry, which just as a word

10:29is incredible. It's a wonderful, highly revealing portmanteau you have barred referring to Shakespeare, of course, referring to the absolute unquestioning worship of idols. Bardolatry. Exactly, Bardolatry. It is the literal religious worship of a secular writer, which sounds extreme. But when you look at the source material, specifically Robert Channasey's The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare and Popular Culture, it becomes crystal clear that this wasn't an accident. Not at all. This wasn't just people liking a play. This was a genuine, engineered cultural movement. If we connect this to the bigger picture, the Channasey reference proves that this was the exact moment Shakespeare ceased to be just a respected historical playwright. Right. Before this Jubilee, his plays were performed, sure. They were liked. People respected the writing. But soft-flowing Avon, the Jubilee, the pageant to Trurilane, these engineered events helped turn him into a foundational pillar of pop culture. They completely rebranded him. They did.

11:30They shifted the focus from the work to the man, and specifically the myth of the man. They didn't just want you to watch Hamlet or McBeth and go home. They wanted you to buy into the entire lifestyle of Shakespeare. This is. They wanted you to revere the ground he walked on, literally the water he lived next to. Think about your own favorite fandom right now. It's a great exercise. Yeah. Whether you are obsessing over the deep, hidden lore of a massive sci-fi universe, analyzing every single lyric of a pop star's new album for secret meanings, or traveling to a specific random city just because your favorite movie was filmed there. We all do it. We do. Yeah. The architectural blueprint for that kind of obsessive, deeply personal cultural worship was being drafted right here in the 18th century with a song about a river. And that emotional connection is the mechanism that makes it all work. Soft-flowing Avon is brilliant because it feels intimate. Yeah. It's not a song about Shakespeare's grand towering literary achievements. It's a gentle song about the river of his childhood.

12:30It deliberately creates a parasocial relationship. Oh, that's such a good way to put it. The audience in London feels an emotional, pastoral connection to a man they never met, facilitated by a catchy, beautifully composed piece of music. They feel like they know him. It's wild to think about. We so often assume that modern-stank culture is a brand new phenomenon fueled entirely by social media algorithms and screen time. But they were doing the exact same thing at the Drillame Theatre in 1769. They were gathering in massive crowds to essentially fanboy over a playwright who had been dead for over a century. Oh, you really were. And singing a song specifically designed by the era's greatest musical fitmaker to make them feel deeply personally connected to his hometown. It is an absolute masterclass in cultural engineering, but there's one final lingering detail in this source material that I think profoundly reframes this entire deep dive. Oh, what's that? I feel like we've covered the song, the composer, the theater, the fandom. What are we missing?

13:31Well, we've spent this entire time talking about Thomas Arne as this grand, almost intimidating architect of high culture, right? Yeah. He is the maestro using his epic, operatic genius to elevate a local river and turn William Shakespeare into a literal deity. But the source notes, one more composition by Arne, written just a few years later, in 1777. Okay. Let me look at the source again. Yes. A hunting, we will go. Exactly. We will go. Wait, the A hunting, we will go. Like the children's song, the little nursery rhyme too. Very same. We're kidding. I am not. It is a catchy, incredibly simple, almost viral, everyday tune. So this raises a profoundly important question for us to consider. Okay. Lay it on me. If a massive, high art cultural movement, like Bartolatry, the literal sanctification of a playwright was fueled by the exact same composer who would quickly pivot to writing a simplistic earworm hunting song. Yeah. What does that say about the engineers of high culture?

14:32That is, wow. That actually makes you rethink the entire machinery behind what we consider prestige. It really does. Because we like to think that high art and low pop culture exist in two completely different universes. We think the people who write grand national anthems and consecrate cultural deities are operating on some elevated spiritual plane. Right. But you're saying it's the exact same guy pulling the levers for both. Precisely. Perhaps the ultimate maistros of history aren't just those who can create untouchable divine idols. Yeah. Perhaps the true geniuses, the ones who really shape society, are those who can seamlessly pull the strings of both ends of the human spectrum. God is fascinating. They can craft profound sacred worship one moment and simple viral entertainment the next. They understand that the human brain craves the Holy Pilgrimage just as much as it craves the catchy jingle. It is all, ultimately, about manipulating emotion. And sometimes the blueprint for both the sacred pilgrimage and the catchy jingle can be found in the exact same place.

15:32Exactly. You walk into the museum expecting to find a dusty, forgotten 18th century artifact, just a simple, gentle song about a soft flowing river. But what you actually find is the master switch for pop culture itself. Still humming with energy, still shaping the way we obsess, idolize, and sing along today. We're listening to a podcast right now, driving, working out, walking the dog. If you're into podcasts, chances are you have something to say too. With RSS.com, starting your own is free and easy. Upload an episode and we distribute it to Apple podcasts, Spotify, Amazon music, and hundreds more. Track your listeners, see where they're from, and start earning from ads like this. Even with just 10 listeners a month. If you've been thinking about starting a podcast, this is your sign. Start free at RSS.com.