Pupils of famous composers

Who was this composer’s teacher?

Many composers taught pupils in a kind of apprenticeship scheme.  Composers often needed the money and no doubt the son or daughter of a wealthy family brought in a useful income.  Some pupils went on to have promising careers – others did not have sufficient talent to succeed.

In last night’s meeting Alan Forshaw played pieces by a variety of composers and asked us to guess who had been their teacher.  A combination of style, dates and where they lived or studied gave us a clue in some cases, especially the earlier ones, but it became steadily more difficult as we approached modern times.  Once again in a Society evening, we heard examples of music by long forgotten composers who’s music is worthy of a hearing.  Many were prolific in their day turning out operas, symphonies and concertos by the dozen.  The pieces we heard were:

  • a piano sonata in C by Johann Muthel a pupil of JS Bach
  • the Adagio from the Symphonie Concertante in A by Ignaz Pleyel, who’s name survives on pianos and music scores.  He wrote 41 symphonies. He was taught by Haydn and his influence was audible
  • Thomas Attwood (pictured) studied in Vienna under Mozart and his remains are buried in St Pauls.  We heard his Rondo from a Trio fo
    Thomas Attwood

    r Piano, Violin and ‘cello

  • this was followed by a Fantasia by Steven Storace who was born in London and also studied in Vienna
  • Carl Czerny is slightly better known and was a pupil of Beethoven.  The master’s influence could clearly be heard in his Theme and Variations for Horn and Piano
  • another pupil of Beethoven was Ferdinand Reis, a native of Bonn (a clue) and his Rondo from a Piano Concerto in C# minor showed a lot of talent
  • Franz Liszt needs no introduction and was a pupil of Czerny in Vienna.  We heard his Hungarian Rhapsody No 13
  • the immensely talented but almost unknown Carl Filtsch from Romania led Liszt to say when he heard him play, he would give up performing.  Tragically, he died in his teens but his Impromptu in Gb Major showed what a loss he was to music
  • another pupil of Czerny was Thomas Tellefsen from Norway who also studied in Paris.  Waltz in Db Major
  • Valsa Caprichosa from 3 Portuguese Scenes was composed by a pupil of Liszt, Jose Vianna da Motta who was born on the island of Sao Tome off the coast of Africa
  • Carl Reinecke has almost disappeared from view and is rarely heard today.  His Finale from Wind Octet in Bb Major was a delight
  • Gabriel Fauré needs no introduction who was a pupil of  Charles-Camille Saint-Saëns.  We heard the famous Paradisum from the Requiem
  • Someone less famous, or even unheard of, is Eugene Gigout also from France who studied in Paris under Saint-Saëns.  His Toccata in B Minor is exciting and worth listening to.  He was a famous organist in his day (born 1844)
  • Josef Suk was part of a large musical family and studied under Antonín Dvořák famous for his Symphony from the New World.  Suk does sometimes make it onto present day concerts and last night we heard the Andante from the Serenade for Strings Opus 6, a fine piece
  • Glazunov was a pupil of  Rimsky-Korsakov and studied in St Petersburg.  A prolific composer and we heard the preamble from Scenes de Ballet
  • another pupil of Rimsky-Korsakov was Igor Stravinsky one of the composers who had an enormous influence over the course of 20th century musical history and famous for his ballets.  His Piano Sonata No 2 was special and well worth a listen if you can
  • the Australian Percy Grainger had several teachers and studied in Berlin and elsewhere.  We heard the extraordinary Zanzibar Boat Song – six hands on one piano
  • Busoni was the teacher of Frederick Loewe famous for his musicals with Alan Lerner and it was The Rain In Spain from My Fair Lady we heard to illustrate his talent
  • Lennox Berkeley was a pupil of the enigmatic Maurice Ravel who’s influence could just be heard in Polka Opus 5a

    Vaughan Williams
  • Finally, another pupil of Ravel was Vaughan Williams (and we will be hearing more of him later in the season with a talk from the Vaughan Williams Society coming).  We heard part of March ‘Seventeen Come Sunday from the Folk Song suite (1924)

Alan had put in a lot of work to track down some of the more obscure pieces especially in the first half which made it an interesting and worthwhile evening.

Peter Curbishley

Next meeting on 30 October

Schubert Centenary Competition

Finishing the Unfinished

It is well-known that Franz Schubert did not finish his eighth symphony, Number 8 in D Minor. What is less well-known that there was a competition launched in 1928 inviting composers to compose the final movements from the surviving notes.  The competition was proposed by the British arm of the Columbia Phonograph company after the bankruptcy of the American parent.  1927 was the centenary of Beethoven’s death and the company released electrical copies of all nine symphonies which were a commercial success.  What to do next?  Well 1928 was the centenary of Schubert’s death and so a competition to complete the Unfinished was proposed.  A prize of over £100,000 in today’s money was to be awarded.

Cue outrage from the musical world and cries of ‘sacrilege’.  The original theme of the competition was dropped and in its place a competition for new works where composers were required to:

[provide] compositions, apart from faultless formal structure, must be marked by the predominance of a vigorous melodic content, and the number of instruments employed must not substantially exceed the measure established by the classical orchestras of time.

Last night’s presentation about this subject was by Robin Lim who had clearly done a deal of research to unearth the background and to find some of the music composed for this competition.

The first piece was by Felix Weingartner and was his Symphony No 6 from which we heard the allegro.  This incorporated some of the known fragments but could not be considered for the competition as he was invited to sit on the judging panel.

Next we heard two movements in symphonic form by Frank Merrick from Bristol, best known in his day as a pianist.

After that was a piece called Pax Vobiscum by john St Anthony Johnson born circa 1874 and about whom little is known.

Finally before the break we heard the 3rd movement from Hans Gal’s Symphony No 1.  Gal lived in Edinburgh and was interned as an enemy alien during WWII.

The evening ended by listening to some of the prize winners.  The judging panel was extraordinary and included Ravel, Respighi, de Falla, Szymanowski and Thomas Beecham.  Third prize went to a piece by Czeslaw Marek (who’s music we have heard in an earlier evening of the Society).  We heard an extract from his symphonia.  This is a composer who we should hear more of as he only rarely appears on concert programmes.

Second prize went to Franz Schmidt and we heard the scherzo from his 3rd Symphony.  This composer does still sometimes still feature in concert programmes – indeed he was performed in the 2015 Proms – but is not well known.

The winner?  This was by the composer Kurt Atterberg and we heard the finale to his 6th Symphony.

The story did not end there though.  Ernest Newman writing in the Sunday Times that;

Atterberg may have looked down the list of judges and slyly made up his mind that he would put ins a bit of something that would appeal to each of them in turn – a bit of Scheherazade for the Russian Glazunov, a bit of Cockaigne for Mr Tovey, a bit of the New World Symphony for Mr Damrosch, and bit of Petrushka for the modernist Alfan and bit of Granados for Salazar … but I wonder if there may not be another explanation  … Atterberg is not merely a composer.  He is a musical critic … suppose he looked round with a cynical smile that was all the world knows all critics wear and decided to pull the world’s leg?

The story was picked up by other newspapers and stories with headlines such as “£2000 Symphony hoax” and “Joke of Swedish Composer” soon appeared.  Columbia sought to recoup the prize money but it was too late — Atterberg had spent it on a new Ford car.

A fascinating insight into a period of musical history which has been all but forgotten.

Peter Curbishley

I am grateful for the notes provided by Robin Lim in writing this piece.

Next meeting 16 October

 

 

 

 

Music of Schubert

NB the programme says 4 October which is incorrect – it is tonight 2nd.

The title of the next meeting is Music from the Schubert Centenary International Composers’ contest of 1928.  It will be presented by Robin Lim and starts at 7:30 in the usual place on Monday 2 October.  Visitors are welcome and there is a modest fee of £3 to cover our expenses.  The evening will start with a brief agm.

[If you saw the piece in last week’s Salisbury Journal, that referred to the previous meeting on Busoni but the item was held over]

 

First meeting tonight

The first meeting of the new season starts tonight, 18 September, in the usual place at the usual time.  It will be a presentation on Busoni by Christopher Guild.  The full programme for the coming season is available at the Collector’s Room in Castle Street, the Tourism Information Centre in Fish Row and the Oxfam Music Room in Catherine Street.  It is also available to print yourself from our previous blog post.

Programme available

The new programme for 2017/18 now available

The Committee has now put together the new programme for the coming 2017/18 season and a pdf version is available below for you to print.  Copies will be available at the first meeting which takes place on 18th of this month and also at the Collector’s Room in Endless Street, Oxfam Music Room in Catherine St. and in the Tourism Information Office in Fish Row.

It is an interesting and diverse programme and includes a speaker from the Vaughan Williams Society.  Bach, Busoni, Shostakovich and Schubert all feature as well as a presentation on Scottish music and music for wind instruments.

On the subject of the leaflet, if you are able to distribute them near to where you live or elsewhere that would be helpful.  If you are for example a member of a choir or other music society, why not ask if you can leave some for members to see?  Or leave some copies in the village hall or in one of the local libraries eg Tisbury; Wilton or Amesbury.

We look forward to seeing you on 18th in the usual place and if you are not a member and would like to give a meeting a try, it is only £3 for the evening. 

Programme 2017/18 (pdf)

(if you cannot download this, you can download a pdf reader for free from Adobe)

 

 

 

New Season

New season programme ready

Image result for busoniThe new season kicks off on 18 September with a presentation on Busoni by Christopher Guild.  Busoni was a musician of great renown at the beginning of the last century but today has been largely forgotten.  He was a pianist, teacher, composer and conductor.  The presentation by Christopher should enlighten us to this Italian composer’s talents.

The full programme will be available on this site soon and hard copies will be available at the Oxfam Music Room, the Collector’s Room in Endless Street, and at the Tourism Information Office in Fish Row.

We look forward to seeing you for the new season.

 

Delius

The works of Frederick Delius
Delius. Delius Society

The works of Frederick Delius were the subject of the Society’s evening on April 24th and we were delighted to welcome Martin Lee-Browne, the ex-president of the Delius Society.  This was an informed presentation – not just because Martin knew a great deal about this composer – but because of the family connections he has with him.  His grandfather was a good friend to Delius and also taught Sir Thomas Beecham the famous conductor.  It was Beecham who did so much to promote the composer.

Delius’s father was a wool merchant and wanted his son to go into the business which he did for about 2 years.  His heart was not in it so he then persuaded his father to help set him up in the orange plantation business in Florida which he did for a couple of years.  He then gave that up and moved to Danville in Virginia.

He studied music in Leipzig in 1886 but was unimpressed with the teaching there which he found old fashioned and apparently, they were not too impressed with him.  He met and became friends with the Norwegian Composer Edvard Grieg and persuaded him to come to England to meet his father.  Norway was a big influence on his work and the Song of the High Hills is based on his time there.  Beecham described this as one of the composer’s major works.

His father was so impressed that his son knew someone as famous as Grieg that he continued funding his musical activities for another year.  This he spent living in Montparnasse in Paris.  He struggled to make a living there as a composer.  By 1899 he had managed to get only 20 songs published.

He returned to England and self-funded a concert of his own works which had mixed success but began to get him recognised as a serious composer.  Gradually his pieces entered the repertoire.   Martin played several of his works – including some early compositions which one would not at first sight have realised were by him – as well as selections from his more famous and familiar works.  These included Brigg Fair, the single movement Violin Concerto and Sea Drift, the latter strongly influenced by Walt Whitman.

Martin Lee-Browne. Picture: Salisbury RMS

Martin also brought along some memorabilia included a score annotated in the margin by Percy Grainger.  In 1910 his health seriously declined and he was only able to compose with the aid of Eric Fenby who wrote the music to Delius’s direction.  He lived for most of his life in Grez-sur-Loing in France and he is buried with his wife in Limpsfield in Surrey.

 

 

 

 

Next meeting

Frederick Delius

Our next meeting on Monday 24th April celebrates the music of the English composer Frederick Delius.  We are pleased to welcome Martin Lee-Browne to the Society who is from the Delius Society and will be coming down from the Midlands to speak to us and play some of his works.

Normal start at 7.30 and details of where we are can be found at the top of the page.  It is £3 for non-members.  Parking is easy and the room is accessible for people with disabilities.  We look forward to seeing you.