Song and supper room

A song and supper room was a type of dining club in mid-nineteenth century Victorian England in which entertainment and good food were provided.

They provided an alternative to formal theatre and music hall with a convivial atmosphere in which the customers were encouraged to perform themselves.

[2] The journal The Town reported in 1837:The epidemic of vocal music has more particularly spread its contagious and devastating influence amongst the youth of the Metropolis, the London apprentice boys.

These young gentlemen generally give vent to their passion and display their vocal abilities in the spacious room appropriated to that purpose of some tavern or public house and these meetings are most aptly denominated Free and Easies: free as air they are for the advancement of drunkenness and profligacy and easy enough of access to all classes of society with little regard to appearances or character.

[2] According to the Scottish comedian W. F. Frame, "a free-and-easy was a happy, go-as-you-please sort of entertainment and a capital preparatory school for budding amateurs.