We’re just 3 weeks away from bringing Coffee Baroque to Fidelio Cafe! Wet your whistle with a brief history of coffee from Kelly O’Reilly. 
In his 1621 opus, The Anatomy of Melancholy, Robert Burton wrote: “The Turks have a drink called coffa (for they use no wine), so named of a berry as black as soot, and as bitter… which they sip still of, and sup as warm as they can suffer; they spend much time in those coffa-houses, which are somewhat like our alehouses or taverns…”. Several decades later, readers would require no such explanation: England was awash with coffeehouses, and people couldn’t get enough of the drink. By the end of the 17th century, London was said to have over 3,000 coffee houses – more than any city outside Constantinople. London’s first coffee house was established in 1652 by Pasqua Rosée, servant to a coffee-loving trader to the Levant. He found tremendous success with his venture and was soon selling over 600 servings a day. His original handbill advertised both the therapeutic and preventative effects of coffee on digestion, headaches, rheumatism, consumption, cough, dropsy, gout, scurvy, and even the plague. It’s a wonder anyone ever got sick.

Others, particularly the ruling classes, viewed coffee with suspicion, arguing that it was the devil’s drug, imported by
heathens. They began cracking down on coffee houses and spreading misinformation about the drink, claiming that it was especially “unfit” for women and children. During the Restoration, London’s coffee houses became increasingly popular. They were hotbeds of gossip for people from all walks of life to talk about state and public affairs – something that greatly alarmed King Charles II. On 29th December 1675, he issued a proclamation that forbade coffee houses to operate because “the Idle and Disaffected persons’ who frequent these establishment have led to ‘very evil and dangerous Effects’ and ‘malicious and scandalous reports to the defamation of His Majesties Government”. The proclamation was so unpopular, however, that it was withdrawn on 8th January 1676 and the British continued their love affair with coffee and coffee houses. These offered an alternative to public houses, being places for discourse of a more sober nature. The penny entry fee covered the cost of newspapers and pamphlets as well as coffee – giving rise to the nickname of Penny Universities. They were busy centres of printed news and intelligence and some catered for specialised commercial interests – including one coffee shop, opened by Edward Lloyd in the 1680s, that eventually became Lloyds of London.

Coffee houses were becoming increasingly popular in Germany, too, and one of the oldest continuously open coffee houses can be found in Leipzig. The Coffee Baum opened in 1694 and, along with other coffee houses in the city, developed a reputation for hosting musical entertainments for their guests. The standard was high. In 1729, Bach was made director of the Collegium Musicum in Leipzig, a municipal music association of students and professional musicians, founded by Georg Philipp Telemann. He gave concerts with this association every Friday evening in the Zimmermannsche Kaffeehaus, on Katharinenstraße, the most elegant street in Leipzig at the time. The owner did not charge rent to the musicians, and the audience had free admission. He made his money through selling coffee, which was still a rare and exotic delicacy in those days. Bach was a particularly dedicated coffee drinker and is said to have consumed up to 30 cups a day!