A first sketch, in reverse to the plate, and the preliminary study, in the same sense, are in the Kupferstichkabinett, Berlin (Schnackenburg, op.cit., nos. 79-80). A further related study was sold at Drouot, Paris, 5 November 1993, lot 178, illustrated (not in Schnackenburg). As Slatkes points out (Pelletier a.o., op.cit., pp. 111-2), this may be compared to a picture attributed to Ostade, with Sedelmeyer, Paris, 1906, possibly identical with that offered, Sotheby's Mak van Waay, Amsterdam, 15 May 1984, lot 57, illustrated. It is probably a copy after a lost original painted in the same sense as the plate (possibly Hofstede de Groot 65). A comparable picture with men looking out of a double opened window was with The Hallsborough Gallery, London, 1959 (Hofstede de Groot 62/3). Jan Steen painted three pictures with comparable subject, K. Braun, Jan Steen, Rotterdam, 1980, nos. 103, 217-8. The subject has been identified as members of the 'Rederijkerskamers' (rhetoricians' chambers) proclaiming rather than singing. This would seem to be confirmed by the fragment of a diamond-shaped blazon in the lower part of the etching, which traditionally carried the insigna and the motto of the individual rhetoricians' chamber. In Cornelis Dusart's copy after a picture by Jan Steen in the Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts, Brussels, sold in these Rooms, 12 November 1990, lot 131, illustrated, such a blazon is hanging on the wall, while a rhetorician is proclaiming in the window. Haarlem had two 'Rederijkerskamers': 'De Pelikaan' and 'De Wijgaertrancken'. The latter had a number of artists as members, including Frans Hals, Dirck Hals, Esaias van de Velde, Salomon de Bray, Gerrit and Job Berckheyde, and apparently also Adriaen Brouwer. No evidence of Ostade being a member has been found. Schnackenburg dates this plate to circa 1660-70, while Slatkes narrows the date to circa 1668.