Shaking All Over

Queen Victoria had a famously accurate ear and, by many accounts, played the piano well herself. Baroness Bloomfield tells a small moment that captures both her musical alertness and her dry sense of humor.

At one gathering the Queen asked Bloomfield to sing. Nervous and trembling, the baroness sang one of Giulia Grisi’s well‑known airs—but she left out the “shake,” what we’d call the trill, at the end.

Victoria caught it immediately. With a smile she turned to Lady Normanby, Bloomfield’s sister, and asked: “Does not your sister shake, Lady Normanby?”

Normanby answered without missing a beat: “Oh, yes, ma’am—she is shaking all over.”