For many people, the anthem And I Saw a
New Heaven, a classic of English church music, is all
that is known today by the composer, pianist, conductor and
teacher, Edgar Bainton. And yet, if we look back 60 years
to the many competitive festivals and choral society events
that were a vital part of British music-making, his part-songs
and choral works were part of the backbone of the repertoire.
If we study the anthem a little more closely, surveying the
natural shape of the melodies in relation to the words, the
imaginative and sensitive harmonic flow, and above all, that
other-worldly quality that is such a special characteristic
of the piece, and which made it such an appropriate contribution
to the Hillsborough Memorial Service at Liverpool's Anglican
Cathedral in 1989, we must surely wish to know more about
the personality and the music of this elusive figure. Such
thoughts prompted the research for this article.
Edgar (Leslie) Bainton was born in London
on 14th February 1880; his father was a Congregational minister
who later moved with his family to Coventry. His abilities
in music and at the piano were noticed early; he made his
first public appearance as solo pianist at 9 years of age,
and at 16 he won an open scholarship to the Royal College
of Music to study piano with Franklin Taylor and theory with
Walford Davies. In 1899 he gained the Wilson Scholarship to
study composition with Sir Charles Villiers Stanford, and
thus became one of the rising generation of British composers
destined to contribute extensively to the English Musical
Renaissance. Unlike some other students, Bainton did not find
Stanford overbearing or restricting, but seems to have derived
great benefit from his studies, as he later wrote:
"It is a curious paradox
that in spite of his dominating personality (at times aggressively
dominating) hardly one of his many pupils' works shows any
influence of Stanford... And this fact in itself is surely
the finest tribute to his teaching that he kept his own personality
in the background and helped them whether they were conscious
of it or not to express themselves, to say clearly what they
had to say."'
Life at the Royal College was not always easy
and he had to supplement his income by undertaking outside
engagements, either as accompanist, as drummer in theatre
orchestras (he was timpanist in the College orchestra) or
on one occasion as organist - playing to Queen Victoria at
Balmoral. His college friends included George (later Sir George)
Dyson, William H. Harris and particularly Rutland Boughton,
who was to be a great help to Bainton's career. His first
surviving work is a Prelude and Fugue in B Minor for
piano, dating from 1898; it is the first entry in his notebook
which lists nearly all his works up to his death, and to which
I shall constantly refer.
In 1901 Bainton was appointed piano professor
to the Newcastle-upon-Tyne Conservatory of Music (it closed
in 1938, four years after his emigration to Australia - see
D.H. Thomas The Newcastle Conservatoire of Music, British
Music Vol 14 1992 pp.). He immersed himself totally
in local musical life-becoming pianist and writer of programme
notes for the Northumbrian Chamber Music Society in 1909,
conductor of the Philharmonic Society (amateur) Orchestra
in 1911, and in 1912 the Principal of the Conservatory. He
decided to enlarge the facilities there by purchasing a large
house in Jesmond Road, a venture which, had it failed, would
have ruined him financially. He had married a former student,
Ethel Eales, in 1905, and their two daughters, Guendolen and
Helen were born in 1906 and 1909. They lived at Stocksfield,
near Hexham, where Bainton gained much inspiration from taking
long country walks, often with his friend, the Lakeland poet,
Wilfred Wilson Gibson; it was through Gibson that Bainton
became part of the literary circle surrounding the poet and
litterateur, Gordon Bottomley. This connection was to result
in Bainton setting many of his poems and writing an opera
to one of his lyric dramas. He was also part of an important
musical circle for introducing much new British music. Works
by Holst, Bax, Vaughan Williams and many others were performed
for the first time in the area, largely through the pioneering
efforts of Bainton, his close friend William Gillies Whittaker
(right), George Dodds (front, second from left) and H. Yeaman
Dodds (rear centre), the violinist Alfred Wall (rear left),
the conductor J.E.Hutchinson and the Cathedral Organist, William
Ellis (left) (photograph ~1930).
In the summer of 1914, while en route to the
Bayreuth Festival, he was arrested as a British civilian in
wartime Germany and interned at a prison camp at Ruhleben,
near Berlin. This was a converted race-course and internees
had to sleep six men to every horse-box. Despite many hardships
this four-year exile proved to be a period of great creative
and practical musical activity, not only for Bainton, who
was placed in charge of all the music at the camp, but also
for a number of other musicians interned there, including
Carl Fuchs (principal cellist in the Halle Orchestra, released
after a few weeks), Benjamin Dale, Frederick Keel the singer-songwriter,
Percy Hull (assistant to G.R.Sinclair at Hereford Cathedral),
Ernest Macmillan and Edward Clark (a colleague from Newcastle,
studying with Schoenberg in Berlin, and European correspondent
for the Musical Times). Many of these were to figure in Bainton's
later career in some way. Bainton directed his own madrigal
group, known as Bainton's Magpies, as well as conducting the
ad hoc orchestra; he played occasional concertos, such as
no.20 in D Minor K466 of Mozart, reviewed in the camp magazine
as:
"..played by Mr.Bainton,
whose very fine technique is better suited to pianoforte writing
of a more modern character, the vigour and robustness of his
playing scarcely compensating for what was lost in the way
of delicacy..."; (2)
one wonders what sort of instrument he had
to play on!
He supervised the taking of degree examinations
in the camp - Ernest Macmillan gained a D.Mus, the papers
being sent to London for assessment. There were Sunday evening
concerts featuring a wide range of orchestral and choral music,
ranging from the classics to works by Massenet (Scenes-Alsatiennes).
Performances of Handel's Messiah were given, and for
the Shakespeare tercentenary celebrations of 1916 The Merry
Wives of Windsor; followed in 1918 by Twelfth Night,
for which Dale wrote the deeply beautiful Come away, Death;
Bainton wrote incidental music for both productions which
was re-worked after the cessation of hostilities into his
Three Pieces for Orchestra. Composition seems to have
been very therapeutic for him throughout this entire period.
An Overture for orchestra was sketched at Frankfurt
1914. During the internment period itself he wrote the
String Quartet in A and songs which included Into the
Silent Land and All Night under the Moon. March
1918 saw a breakdown in his health and he was transferred
along with several other internees to The Hague for convalescence.
He was placed in charge of music activities for the YMCA and,
after the Armistice, he was engaged as the first English musician
ever to conduct the Amsterdam Concertgebouw Orchestra in two
concerts of British music by Balfour Gardiner (the Overture
to a Comedy), Bridge, Coleridge-Taylor, Delius, Elgar,
Grainger and Stanford before his return home.
At home, as life returned to normal he resumed
his work at the Conservatory which his wife had run single-handed
since the outbreak of war. He wrote an article for the Musical
Times on his wartime experiences in Ruhleben, and lectured
on a wide range of topics for the Newcastle Literary and Philosophical
Society, as well as undertaking frequent conducting engagements,
including premieres of his own works, such as Before Sunrise
and A Song of Freedom and Joy. His works also featured
at the Three Choirs Festivals, through the influence of Percy
Hull, now the Director of Music at Hereford. He became a regular
examiner for the Associated Board and began to travel extensively.
He went on a tour of Australia and Canada from April 1930
to January 1931, the only time his composition ceased, and
from August to December 1932 he toured India, where he gave
a piano recital for the Indian Broadcasting Company and was
the guest in Calcutta of the celebrated poet and musician,
Rabindranath Tagore, who introduced him to the beauties of
Indian music. His Australian visit had obviously made a significant
impression on the governing body of the New South Wales Conservatorium
at Sydney for him to be offered the Directorship in the summer
of 1933. He was awarded an honorary D.Mus at Durham University
by Sir Edward Bairstow, and in 1934 the family prepared to
start a new and exciting life in Australia.
In her biography of her father, Remembered
on Waking, Helen Bainton writes:
"In 1934, a year remembered
for the deaths of Elgar, Delius and Holst, my father came
to this country. He was steeped in the traditions of the English
Schools of Music, with their choral, orchestral, operatic,
chamber music and general scholastic training. He came filled
with enthusiasm and an abiding love for the work he was to
do, and whatever he undertook was done with his whole mind
and heart. His vitality was unbounded; his thoughts simple
and direct. He was highly strung and very sensitive but possessed
great self-control, due to his sense of discipline and rigorous
physical training. His temper could quickly rise and as quickly
be forgotten, and he possessed a deep philosophy of life....
From this he realised how precious were the small, simple,
day to day tasks and was contented with his life. He never
strove for success nor wished for power, but was deeply aware
of the need for spreading the understanding and appreciation
of an artistic inheritance."3
Thus he took a very active interest in all
aspects of the Conservatorium, from conducting the choral
and orchestral classes, founding the Opera School, to supervising
the interior decorating. Many unknown works were introduced
by him to Australia, including Elgar's Second Symphony in
1934, The Dream of Gerontius in 1936, and The Apostles
in 1940. His Arrival in Sydney coincided with plans to
establish a permanent professional orchestra under the aegis
of the Australian Broadcasting Commission (ABC); this was
to become the New South Wales Symphony Orchestra (later the
ABC Sydney Symphony Orchestra), and Bainton conducted the
inaugural concert in 1934. He introduced much British music,
including Bax's Third Symphony, for which he wrote an introductory
article for the Sydney Morning Herald, Vaughan Williams's
Job, Five Variants on Dives and Lazarus, and works
by Delius, Walton, Debussy and Sibelius amongst many others.
At the Conservatorium he also gave opportunities to native
Australian composers such as Alex Bumard, Roy Agnew, Miriam
Hyde, Arthur Benjamin, F.S.Kelly (killed in action in 1916),
Percy Grainger and the senior composer Alfred Hill, who had
conducted at the 'Con' for many years. Perhaps the high point
of every year was the annual performance of Bach's St Matthew
Passion which, as the years progressed, attained a height
of spiritual magnificence still remembered to this day. There
is a famous Bainton 'story' attached to one of these performances,
as Helen relates:
"On the day of the performance,
father would be studying his score, or reading Spitta's J.S.Bach
right up to the moment when he left for the Conservatorium.
On arrival he always went backstage with his tuning-fork to
test each player, after the custom of Sir Henry Wood. Orchestral
players often play cards before concerts, or when they have
long waiting periods. Father was horrified on entering the
bandroom to find a game of cards in progress his own mind
was far removed from such mundane things. He stopped and said
to the players in tones of extreme sorrow: 'Gentlemen, not
before Bach."' 4
The climax of his career was the premiere
production by the Conservatorium Opera School of The Pearl
Tree in 1944; this received unanimous acclaim from press
and public, so much so that an extra night's performance had
to be given. A bust sculpted by Arthur Fleishmann in Bainton's
honour was unveiled in the foyer at the Conservatorium on
this occasion. In 1946 the opera was repeated, but this was
the year he had to retire, owing to regulations stipulating
compulsory retirement at 65; Bainton was unhappy at this ruling
as he had so much more to give to his work. In the event,
he was as much in demand as previously, taking over temporary
conductorship of the New Zealand Orchestra, on the retirement
of Anderson Tyrer, and giving further lecture tours in Canada,
at the invitation of Sir Ernest Macmillan, who had gained
his D Mus in Ruhleben with Bainton's help. His composing continued,
culminating in the Third Symphony, though he also ventured
into film music with a score for a short documentary film
on the Australian Bush Police. However, a heart attack which
followed the death of his wife, put his health under strain;
he died while taking his morning swim on Point Piper beach
on December 8th 1956. After his death his collection of manuscripts
and personal papers were presented to the Mitchell Library,
Sydney, by his daughter Helen; these form the largest part
of his remaining MSS., though several of his works are preserved
at the Conservatorium, the ABC Federal Library and the Australian
Music Centre.
Of her father's musical personality, Helen
says:
"He felt deeply and emotionally,
but it was hidden behind a somewhat reticent exterior. His
music does not readily reveal itself." 5.
As Bainton travelled in life, so his music
travels across the private world of the spiritual imagination
which his knowledge of literature helped to create. The orchestral
scores I have been able to study show a richness of melody,
a clarity and fastidiousness of thought and an exceptional
sensitivity and harmonic fluidity which is the hallmark of
his style and which lifts his best work to a particularly
heightened state of imagination. Although Bainton was very
much in close contact with contemporary musical events at
the turn of the century-he was one of the first musicians
in England to study Schoenberg scores, including Gurrelieder
which was sent to him by Edward Clark, then a student
of Schoenberg in Berlin, and he introduced his friend W.G.
Whittaker to Holst's Hymns from the Rig Veda straight
from the manuscript-nevertheless he is still to be regarded
as a composer who represents a maturing of tendencies, rather
than striking out in bold and new ways. This is seen above
all in his lifelong love and reverence for the music of J.S.Bach:
as Hans Forst, a friend of Bainton's in Australia for many
years, has written:
"...he was a valiant fighter
for his English contemporary composers, particularly Vaughan
Williams, but everything was rooted in his dedication to Bach...What,
however, I shall never forget was when approaching his home,
I heard him play Bach on the piano-just for himself. That
was fulfilment for this extremely shy man... "6
Bainton had published nearly 100 solo songs
and 114 part-songs. Many were written as presents for his
wife, and his vast knowledge of literature meant that a wide
range of poets were set by him; certainly the greater part
of his output is based on literature, either as vocal settings
or as instrumental works with a literary programme of some
kind. Bainton set classic poets - Shelley, Browning (both
Robert and Elizabeth), Blake, Tennyson, Ben Jonson, Milton
and Coleridge; but it is the extraordinary number of minor
figures from the Georgian period and beyond, many forgotten
today, that figure most often in his work. Eva Gore-Booth,
Alice Meynell, Lascelles Abercrombie and Thomas Lovell Beddoes,
to name just a few, may be shadowy figures, but this is not
to say that they should not be rediscovered and re-evaluated;
this is certainly the case with the poets he knew best of
all - Gordon Bottomley and Wilfred Wilson Gibson, who figure
most frequently in his vocal output. Of the solo songs, Slow,
slow, fresh fount, Ring out, wild Bells, and Valley
Moonlight with its modal leanings towards C minor while
the key is G minor, seem to have been reasonably well-known.
Of the part-songs, The Ballad of Semmerwater was particularly
famous; perhaps a change of fashion may re-introduce some
of these to the repertoire. There are surprisingly few settings
for voice and orchestra-two Yeats settings: The Cap and
Bells and The Fiddler of Dooney were conducted
by Bainton for the British Musical League Festival at Birmingham
in 1913 but I have found no trace of them. In 1910 he set
two Edward Carpenter poems, Christmas Eve and Little
Bird within thy Cage for baritone and a sizeable but economically-scored
orchestra (assigned to the Mitchell collection from the Rutland
Boughton Trust), but these are juvenilia in comparison to
An English Idyll, to words by Neville Cardus, which was
premiered at Bainton's retirement concert in 1946 by Harold
Williams (baritone) with the ABC Symphony Orchestra. This
is a setting of several poems, evoking the English scenery
of Shrewsbury, a London evening in June looking up to Ludgate
Hill, the lights of Piccadilly and the chattering birds of
St Martin's-in-the-Fields, and a description of St Paul's
Cathedral. The poet was also the critic and described the
work as: "...poetry and pageantry changed to music, in which
a ripe orchestral culture is warmed by imagination, and an
Englishman's sense of language, cadence and atmosphere." 7
The work is kept at the ABC Library and also exists
in a broadcast recording; Cardus went on to describe it as
"without doubt a contribution by Dr Bainton to English song
of lasting importance", 8 for that reason alone
it surely deserves a hearing in this country.
Of Bainton's church music, there is very little.
And I Saw A New Heaven (completed June 13th 1928) takes
pride of place in keeping his name alive at all today; of
his other anthems, Open thy Gates (Herrick) and In
the Wilderness (Robert Graves) retain the spiritual detachment
of his more famous piece. They are available from Oxford Music
Archive Service, York, and both deserve more frequent hearings.
Other anthems are Fiat Lux from Novello and The
Heavens Declare thy Glory, but as the latter was originally
published by Curwen, as were so many of Bainton's works, it
is now very difficult to obtain. Mention should also be made
here of his only organ work, the Fantasia on 'Vexilla Regis',
completed in 1925 but only published in 1973 by Albert's of
Sydney; a modest four minutes but nevertheless showing Bainton's
fluency at the instrument, it rises to a powerful climax at
the end and makes a suitable and effective voluntary for Passiontide.
Considering Bainton's acknowledged skills
as a pianist, it is disappointing to discover only miniatures
for the instrument. Many of these, such as From "Faery"
and Four Tone Pictures (both from Augener) probably
had reasonable sales, though they were very much regarded
as "bread and butter music" by the rest of the family. More
interesting and worthwhile are the Capriccio in G minor
(Ascherberg), Visions (Allan's of Melbourne) and White
Hyacinth (OUP) which is a brilliant caprice with an element
of fantasy and requires exceptional technique. There is also
a Miniature Suite and Dance for piano duet. His most
important and substantial work for piano is undoubtedly the
Concerto Fantasia for piano and orchestra, his second
work to receive a Carnegie Trust award in 1920, though he
had started on it in 1917. At a performance given in Birmingham
in 1921, with the composer as soloist, the critic Alfred Sheldon
wrote "...the event introduced to Birmingham the most considerable
contribution to the repertory of music for piano in combination
with orchestra we have had from a composer for many years."
9 Its four movements and Epilogue are dominated by a
cadenza which is no mere decoration, but an integral part
of the thematic material; it appears throughout in various
guises linking its original form together. The first orchestral
entry opens with one of the most crucial themes of the whole
work. The tempo increases to double speed and a new theme
is introduced that appears to bear no relation to the previous
theme, but this is soon dispelled as the original theme sounds
out in bars of 3/2 crossing over the 4/4 bars of the soloist.
The major climax of the first movement is for orchestra alone,
which is certainly unusual for a piano concerto and enhances
the symphonic nature of the work. The second movement is a
light-hearted scherzo, poking fun in a style typical of Richard
Strauss's Till Eulenspiegel; this gives way to the
third movement (Improvisation) in which the cadenza leads
us by means of a beautifully woven harmonic sequence on the
piano, into the slow movement proper, presenting new themes
against piano arpeggios and sumptuous harmonies, which nevertheless
work together in perfect proportion. In the Finale the original
first movement theme seems to appear from underground in the
texture before leading to the final climax and Epilogue. The
concerto has been broadcast three times on BBC Radio 3 in
recent years and performing materials are available from Stainer
& Bell. At 26 minutes (Bainton's official timing) it should
easily find a place in concert programmes.
It was inevitable that Bainton, with his natural
desire for word-setting, would have been drawn towards the
challenge of the operatic form. Because of his interest in
the Bayreuth festivals, he wished to use the music drama as
his model, in which the poem, music and general stage effect
form a complete picture. Bainton's notebook describes such
a music-drama being composed between January 1905 and October
1906; this must have been Oithona, to a libretto based
on the poems of Ossian. Oithona, beloved of Gaul, has been
carried off by Dunromath, Lord of Uthal, to a deserted island.
Gaul learns of this in a dream and finds her. Determined to
seek revenge, Gaul prepares to do battle with Dunromath and
his warriors. Unknown to him, Oithona though told to hide
away from the hostilities, takes up arms herself to defeat
Dunromath and is wounded, dying in Gaul's arms.
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Photographs 1915
(supplied by Michael Jones)
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Through his close friendship with Rutland
Boughton, Bainton was closely involved with the Glastonbury
festivals. His opera for children, Walooki the Bear (Curwen
1912) was considered for the first of these festivals but
it was Oithona which was performed at the 1915 Festival in
two matinee and evening performances on August 11th and 12th,
sharing the bill with Wagner's Tristan and Isolde.
The three main characters were Oithona-Marjorie Ffrangcon-Davies,
Gaul-Frank Mullings (a famous Othello) and Dunromath-Herbert
Langley. It is thought that the Wookey Hole Male-voice Choir
were used for the Hymn to the Sun, and the performances were
directed from the piano by Clarence Raybould. Bainton was
unable to hear the work as he was interned in Germany; it
was not thought to have been orchestrated and all traces of
any material relating to the score have disappeared, implying
perhaps that Bainton later withdrew the work.
Through his association with Gordon Bottomley,
Bainton started work on another music-drama, The Crier
by Night, in July 1911, completing the vocal score in
June 1912, though the full score was not finished until January
1919. Helen tells us of a private performance of the work
in Newcastle, with an "orchestra-filled room" 8 and
soloists who included such distinguished names as Dorothy
Silk as Blanid and Norman Allin as the Crier. Bainton was
later privileged to conduct the ABC Symphony Orchestra in
a studio performance of the opera on Saturday evening, 8th
August 1942, with soloists Evelyn Lynch (Blanid), Isolde Hill
(Thorgerd), Harold Williams (Hialti), and Stanley Clarkson
(The Old Strange Man). Bottomley's dramatic poem draws upon
Celtic and Nordic legend, and two of the characters, Blanid
and the Old Man, contain elements of the supernatural in their
natures. The opera is set at the time when the Danes have
conquered Western Britain and taken even high-born women as
slaves, such as Blanid a " jewelled queen", at present the
slave of Hialti and his wife Thorgerd, who treats her cruelly.
In the first scene, Blanid is preparing the meal when she
is taunted by Thorgerd about singing her songs of "faery and
nameless kings, and things that NEVER happened" Thorgerd also
taunts her husband, accusing him of a secret liaison with
Blanid, which he quietly but firmly denies. During these arguments
a distant cry is heard from outside-the warning call for "The
Crier of the Ford", who lures wayfarers to their death in
the lake. Scene 2 follows after a brief pause. Blanid sings
of her past life of riches, and opens the door to call the
Crier for the Ford, the old "father of many waters" to help
her. An old strange man appears, singing of old joys but warning
her that he will bring "neither joy or misery, but only rest."
He goes out and shortly afterwards a cry for help is heard;
Hialti rushes out to help but drowns in the lake. The Old
Strange Man appears at the door telling Blanid that he has
come for her too; she beseeches Thorgerd to punish her but
Thorgerd is unmoved, even when Blanid says that if she goes
with the Crier, it will be "to Hialti's arms for evermore".
Blanid then rushes into the night, a scream is heard from
her as the curtain falls.
It is clear why such a story appealed to Bainton,
for it portrays the oppression of the free spirit by earthly
materialistic forces as epitomised by the slavery of Blanid
and her captors. Bainton is intensely sympathetic towards
Blanid, and her characterisation is marked with much imagination
in the orchestral texture, particularly at the beginning of
Scene 2 where she sings longingly of her former days; Bainton's
writing for the strings here creates a delicate, almost sensuous
range of sound, closely mirroring the words she sings. This
opera therefore needs orchestral backing to bring out the
dramatic colouring; although scored for a large orchestra
this expense could be offset by the fact that the production
would only require one set of scenery. It would make an effective
and dramatic half of a double-bill, and as no chorus is required,
could be presented with Holst's The Wandering Scholar or a
similar work. A full score and vocal score are held by BMS
Archives, though the orchestral parts from the 1942 broadcast
are still in Australia; it still awaits its premiere production.
But surely, the Bainton opera most in need
of a modern production is The Pearl Tree: an opera-phantasy
in two acts, written to a libretto by Robert Calverley Trevelyan
(originally conceived as a stage play) and completed in August
1925 (the full score in November 1927). It had to wait until
1944 for its premiere, at the New South Wales Conservatorium
Opera School, with a cast which included such established
local names as Harold Williams (the Rishi), Dorothy Helmrich
(Radha) and Raymond Nillson (Krishna); the stage designs were
by Harold Abbott (Bainton's son-in-law), though it was left
to Guenda to carry them out, as her husband was called up
for military duties. The four nights were totally sold-out.
An extra night had to be put on to accommodate people turned
away previously. The entire production was repeated in 1946.
Neville Cardus, at that time writing for the Sydney Morning
Herald, described the opera as "spontaneously and sensitively
composed," and went on to say:
"The fusion of vocal melody
and recitative into a continuously flowing orchestral tissue
is a constant delight to the practised ear, and there are
resource and invention throughout. The orchestration produces
as sustained a succession of beautiful sound as any I have
heard in the theatre since I attended an opera by Richard
Strauss."10
The story is based on an Indian legend and
takes place in a Hindu village and later in the jungle near
the Jumna river. The story revolves around the love of Krishna,
a God in human incarnation, for Radha, a humble cow-girl.
His love-song in Act I forms the musical apotheosis to the
whole opera, but at this point he plays his flute to attract
the attention of the Rishi, an ancient hermit and yogi, who
sings (in one of the published songs) of his final discovery
of God in Krishna himself, after twenty years of waiting.
(The spiritual allegory in this work seem to have appealed
to one lady observer, who is reported to have commented to
the composer that she enjoyed The Pearl Tree as if
were an oratorio!). Sudama, a cowman and friend of Krishna,
wishes to adorn his cattle with pearl necklaces to make them
more attractive. In the first appearance of the 'pearl theme'
Krishna asks Sudama to be his messenger to Radha, to request
a single pearl in order to grow a pearl tree. Radha indignantly
refuses this request. Yashoda, Krishna's mother, hears of
this and gives him a pearl from her own necklaces which he
plants in the ground. As he plays his flute, the Pearl Tree
starts to grow, bearing thousands of pearls, to the delighted
astonishment of all onlookers. This is the climax and end
of Act I. At the beginning of Act II Lalita, one of Radha's
friends, has witnessed unnoticed the scene of the Pearl Tree
and relates the event to Radha, who refuses to believe her.
Then, left alone, she begins to regret her selfish pride and
unbelief and resolves to seek the Rishi's guidance. On finding
him alone in the forest, she asks, "How may I find Krishna?"
"That, thou alone canst know," he says. Slowly the great lights
of a celestial city are revealed, their gates guarded by the
Asparas, the celestial dancing-maidens. Radha approaches,
seeking Krishna, but the Asparas rebuke her for her lack of
faith in her divine lover and refuse to admit her. The city
vanishes, and in its place the Pearl Tree appears in a radiant
light. Radha is greatly humbled by this spectacle and seeks
forgiveness from Krishna, who appears (at the sound of Ex
1 in the orchestra) and sings his original love-song. As they
walk into the forest, Radha offers Krishna her own pearl necklace,
but he refuses it, saying, "I need none, for love's pearl
once more is mine."
In view of Bainton's occasional visits to
Bayreuth it is not surprising that this opera is built securely
on various thematic motifs, as we have just seen; this was
the practice with several contemporaries. including Josef
Holbrooke and Bainton's friend, Rutland Boughton. The ending,
which is reminiscent of Parsifal and even in the same key,
with its deeply beautiful and sublime progression of harmonies,
is totally equal in power and effect to the sunset ending
of Delius's A Village Romeo and Juliet, and is certainly among
the finest music written by any British composer this century.
Although three songs were published separately (by Nicholson's
of Sydney, 1945), they are not suitable to stand alone and
really do need to be heard as part of the entire structure.
For this reason one wonders if the concert performance of
mere excerpts, given in Sydney in October 1987, by Australian
Opera, with only piano accompaniment and shorn of its stage
decor, could have made any impact at all. There are fine vocal
opportunities for the two main characters, but the chorus,
consisting exclusively of Radha's and Krishna's friends (girls
and boys respectively) are never on stage together as a full
chorus. Modern stage technology would make light work of the
growing Pearl Tree and the celestial city lights, and a set
of performing materials are available from the BMS
Archive.
A number of unpublished orchestral works which
form a very important part of Bainton's output received occasional
performances during the first half of this century; in this
respect he was especially fortunate in receiving the support
of both Sir Dan Godfrey of the Bournemouth Municipal orchestra,
and Sir Henry Wood for the Proms at Queen's Hall, London,
as did many aspiring young British composers. His first orchestral
piece was Pompilia, which received its premiere at
the 1903 Proms on October 8th conducted by Henry Wood who
thought that it "... portrayed so admirably the fundamental
idea underlying the narrative in The Ring and the Book...".
Again we see the inspiration that Bainton derived from literature.
We next hear of the premiere at Bournemouth on October 15th
of his early Symphony in B Flat, subtitled A Phantasy of
Life and Progress, Op.9. From the programme note we read
that the first movement is prefaced by Job 38, verse 7, "When
the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted
for joy." The note goes on to give a good analysis of the
music and I am somewhat amused by the remark: "The composer
is evidently quite in touch and sympathy with modern art,
and does not pin his faith to classical models''(!) 12.
The second and third movements are prefaced by quotations
from Whitman, Byron and Nietzsche; the note also describes
the orchestration as requiring extra woodwind (cor anglais,
bass clarinet and double bassoon) and "...showing high imaginative
powers."' Alas, I suspect this rather ambitious work was probably
disowned by the composer, as only Pompilia survives
of these two works in the Mitchell collection.
The next work to be performed was the Suite,
The Golden River Op. 16, which was premiered at Bournemouth
with the composer conducting, on March 1 5th, 1909. The story
tells of three brothers, the two elder of whom were ugly and
evil, while the youngest brother, Gluck, was a beautiful innocent
child. It is in four movements, the third of which depicts
the two "black brothers" trying to reach the Golden River
(a kind of fairy Eldorado) and being turned into black stones.
The score and parts are in the Sydney Conservatorium Library
and the work is scored for conventional forces with harp and
double bassoon. Shortly after The Golden River Bainton
composed the Overture-Phantasy, Prometheus, a commission
for the 1909 Newcastle Festival where it received its first
performance on October 20th, and was repeated at Bournemouth
on December 23rd. Again we read of scoring for "a large orchestra"
(50 players at Bournemouth) and also that the themes representing
Prometheus and his yearning for freedom "are developed with
much skill and elaboration, the rhythmic combinations being
both interesting and original", (score in the Mitchell Library).
The premiere of Four Dances also took place in Bournemouth,
in December 1910. They were scored for small orchestra and
possibly no longer survive. This may also be the case with
the Celtic Sketches premiered by the Newcastle Philharmonic
Society Orchestra and the composer in February 1912 and then
at Bournemouth in March 1912 and finally at the Proms on October
10th. that year. While in Ruhleben, Bainton wrote some incidental
music for the camp productions of Shakespeare's Merry Wives
of Windsor and Twelfth Night; an Intermezzo
from the former and a Humoresque from the latter were
later to become part of the Three Pieces for Orchestra
of 1919, together with an opening Elegy. This piece
and the Intermezzo were first performed at the 1919
Proms, on September 20th, conducted by the composer and the
first complete performance was at Bournemouth on January 6th
1921, and subsequently for Bainton's first appearance at the
Three Choirs Festivals, at Hereford that year. The 1921 Prom
season saw the premiere of Paracelsus (after Browning)
conducted by the composer on August 31st and repeated at Bournemouth
in January 1922. This had been written in 1904 but was later
re-written and rescored. His next piece, Eclogue, was
completed in May 1923, premiered at Bournemouth on January
5th, 1928 and repeated at the 1928 Proms but its score and
parts are at present is missing. His last tone-poem, Epithalamion,
(from Spenser's Poem) was first performed at the Three Choirs
Festival on August 11th 1929. It also featured at the 1932
Proms, and as part of the prestigious BBC British Music Festival
of 1931, conducted by (Sir) Adrian Boult. Performing materials
are held by ABC Sydney and there is also a broadcast recording
which reveals a lively, colourful and cleanly-scored piece,
with a lovely middle section based on a duet-interplay for
two violins soaring in the fashion of " their merry musick
that resounds from far." Bainton's only published orchestral
work is the Pavane, Idyll and Bacchanal for strings
with flute solo in the Idyll and additional tambourine in
the Bacchanal; this was completed in 1924 and published by
Oxford University Press in 1925. These and the earlier three
pieces for orchestra have been recorded in Australia, but
of these two works, the Pavane, Idyll and Bacchanal is
the most immediately attractive and memorable, if lightweight.
Sensitively and imaginatively scored, they fully deserve occasional
performance as part of a light music programme. The Bacchanal
is in 514 with occasional shift 2+3 and 3+2, with a well-contrasted
and quite beautiful middle section enhanced by the metric
alternation. Bainton's notebook lists very few chamber works.
An early Piano Quintet in A of 1904 and a String
Quartet, listed as Op.26, of 1911, which received a performance
at the Dunhill Chamber Concerts during that period, may no
longer survive. We immediately pass on to his three most important
works in this genre. The String Quartet in A was completed
in Ruhleben in October 1915 and originally stood as a three
movement work in which the opening theme formed the basis
of the essential material which returned at the end; in this
form it was premiered by the Philharmonic Quartet at the De
Lara Chamber Music Concerts Series, on June 25th 1919. Bainton
subsequently withdrew the work and by July 1920 it had been
thoroughly revised, condensed and a Finale added, which further
reworked the opening material. It has been known for a long
time in Australia in a recording by the Austral Quartet, but
has now been newly recorded for the BBC by the Alberni Quartet
for future transmission on Radio 3. In 1924 Bainton wrote
a Cello and Piano Sonata in four movements. He had
in mind Carl Fuchs, principal cellist of the Halle Orchestra
and a fellow internee in Ruhleben, when he worked on the piece,
and it is believed that the premiere given by them took place
in Manchester at about that time. The weight of musical interest
is directed to the last two movements: the third movement
(Lento) although very beautiful, is almost too short, it ends
with a most original cadence in Db major. The finale recapitulates
the opening first movement material to unify the work. It
was available for some years on an Australian Columbia recording
by John Kennedy and the composer in 1951 (LOX 811/2,78 rpm);
this is possibly the only known recording of Bainton as pianist
and shows him as a first-class interpreter.
This sonata, however, is relatively lighter
fare when placed beside Bainton's Sonata for Viola and
Piano of 1922; not only is this original and powerful
work one of the very finest of Bainton's whole output, it
is also one of the greatest viola sonatas of its time. The
initial idea of writing such a work come from the late Lionel
Tertis (1876-1975), whose artistic example did a very great
deal to establish the viola as a solo instrument during the
first half of this century, and for whom many works were written
by the rising generation of British composers. In Remembered
on Waking Helen describes Tertis's visit to the family
home in Newcastle to try over the sonata, which she describes
as "..a beautiful work, having that song-like quality which
is so much a part of the composer's creative sense."'3
Sadly, Tertis never played the sonata, and its first
performance was given by Helen and her father on Monday, 12th
October 1942 (9.30pm) on the ABC Radio National Programme
"The Composer Performs", at which time Helen was a viola-player
with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra. Its first public performance
was given at a concert at the Birmingham and Midland Institute
on Thursday 4th.May 1989, by Martin Outram, viola and Michael
Jones, piano.
The sonata is in three movements and is written
in progressive tonality (E minor-A minor-D minor). The "song-like
quality" dominates much of the viola writing which covers
a wide range, both technically (frequently going up to third
position) and expressively. Bainton captures a unique mood
in the work-part autumnal, part elegiac, and deeply reminiscent
of past experiences. This is expressed in a passionately intense
and fast-moving harmonic language. I would like to see this
remarkable 25 minute work take its place in the repertoire.
Considering the exceptionally high standard
of the northern choral societies at the turn of the century,
it is inevitable that Bainton would be drawn towards writing
for them. We get a glimpse of their achievements in the autobiography
of Sir Henry Coward, published by Curwen in 1919. Perhaps
the greatest choral conductor of his time, he has this to
say of the Newcastle and Gateshead Choral Union Festival of
1909:
"Every work went magnificently.
Every composer was in raptures. The whole festival was a triumph
musically, financially and socially. The choral singing was
as remarkable in its way as the first Sheffield festival,
and if the edge of wonderment had not been forestalled by
that epoch-making event, it would have called forth as great
an outburst of surprise and congratulation from the press."'4
From this it seems likely that The Blessed
Damozel was given an ideal performance at the Newcastle
concert on the 22nd November 1907, conducted by the composer,
with Elgar's The Dream of Gerontius conducted by Coward
in the second half. The text by Dante Gabriel Rossetti was
hardly unknown to British Composers. Bainton's setting for
mezzo-soprano, baritone, chorus and orchestra, was worked
over from June 1906 until the following March, and it is his
first important work in this medium. (His notebook lists a
Mignon's Requiem for boys' voices, chorus and orchestra of
March 1904, but this was probably withdrawn). One is already
aware, even in such an early work, of great flexibility and
sensitivity of harmonic flow in the vocal texture with its
sub-divided parts for the male voices and occasional high
tenor parts-a typical characteristic of Bainton's tenor writing.
Bainton also keeps the chorus on their toes rhythmically with
a section of varying 9/8 and 12/8 bars, (at "We two, she said,
will seek the groves where the Lady Mary is"). Although his
melodic lines have an Elgarian feel to them, any element of
derivativeness is guarded against by the overall level of
inspiration and onward sweep of imagination. The performance
probably lasted in the region of 30 minutes and I see no reason
why this work should not compare well with other contemporary
settings as the product of a young, highly-gifted and promising
composer beginning to find his feet. Dorking Performing Arts
Library have a set of vocal scores available, but the full
score and parts are now part of the Mitchell Library collection.
1907 also saw the completion (between 3rd April and 16th December)
of the vast and rather ambitious choral symphony Before
Sunrise, for contralto solo, chorus and orchestra (from
Swinburne's Songs Before Sunrise) which was published
by Stainer and Bell in 1920. It was the first of Bainton's
work to receive a prestigious Carnegie Trust award in 1917,
the first year of these awards. Other presentations included
Vaughan Williams's A London Symphony, Frank Bridge's
suite, The Sea, Howells's Piano Quartet in A Minor
and Rutland Boughton's opera, The Immortal Hour. The
work is in four movements, Genesis-Tenebrae-A Watch In
The Night-Hymn of Man, the first movement is purely orchestral,
acting as a prelude which presents several themes heard throughout
the symphony, ending in a fanfare-like idea which will re-appear
significantly in the Finale. The Tenebrae movement includes
the first contralto solo, "At the chill tide of the night,"
which is accompanied by material from the opening section
of Genesis; this leads to a very Elgarian theme for the first
chorus entry of the work, "O Spirit of man" which will return
in the finale. After the stormy opening of the third movement,
the basses declaim, "Watchman, what of the night?" "Storm,
thunder and rain," answer the chorus, setting the tone of
the movement. In the Hymn of Man, the fanfare motif rings
out like a fanfare in triumphal glory, and the 47-bar orchestral
opening brings in other themes form the first movement and
rises to a climax before diminishing to the first chorus entry
(pp) "In the grey beginning of years". Eventually the Genesis
theme re-appears, and the Elgarian theme is the setting for
"For his face is set to the East. Eventually we arrive at
the Coda, a bracing allegro molto in contrapuntal style with
the sopranos declaiming "Glory to Man in the highest," which
is taken up by the rest of the chorus, the fanfare motif having,
expectedly, the final word. By the time of the symphony's
first performance, by the Newcastle and Gateshead Choral Union,
on 6th April 1921 I have the impression that it must have
already begun to sound dated. I feel that such a work, having
been finished fourteen years earlier, was too ambitious a
project to undertake successfully at that time. Although well
constructed and effectively written for the chorus, the thematic
ideas are not amongst Bainton's finest inspirations: also,
the general thematic development is highly sequential and
formula-bound, perhaps in the way that his former professor,
Stanford, to whom the work is dedicated, would have approved.
The shadows of Elgar, and even Mendelssohn, found there detract
from its being seriously considered as a work of promising
originality; by the time of its completion it would have had
to compete with Vaughan Williams's A Sea Symphony,
destined for the 1910 Leeds Festival, Delius's A Mass of
Life, and Holst's Hymns from the Rig Veda. After
1921, competition with Holst's Choral Symphony and
Choral Fantasia, Constant Lambert's The Rio Grande
and Walton's Belshazzar's Feast, and with the highly
imaginative, original and enterprising Psalm 139 and Requiem
Aeternam of his friend W G Whittaker, would surely have
relegated Before Sunrise to a distant backwater. Perhaps
it would be worthwhile to hear a modern performance (performing
materials readily available), but the low tessitura of the
solo part requires a real contralto, not a present-day mezzo
soprano, and this would add further difficulties to a modern
performance.
1908 saw Bainton's less ambitious attempt
at a large-scale choral work, The Transfiguration of Dante,
Op.18. Started in May that year, it had reached vocal-score
form by December and is now part of the Library of the Birmingham
Conservatoire. It opens with a choral prologue, Spirit of
Flame, for unaccompanied double chorus of 3-4 minutes duration,
and shows the confidence Bainton had in the choirs at his
disposal. Even in this form, the themes and motifs for the
principal characters, Dante Beatrice, Angelo, Prior and Death,
are clearly delineated and thoroughly worked out though I
suspect some modifications would have been made in subsequent
revisions The next choral works were Sunset at Sea,
Op.20, and The Vindictive Staircase both published
by Stainer and Bell, 1912 and 1913) who held performing materials
on hire. Both these works were premiered in London by the
enterprising Edward Mason Choir and Orchestra conducted by
Edward Mason; Sunset at Sea was given on March 25th
1912 and the Vindictive Staircase on March 18th 1914.
Bainton would clearly have known the librettist of the first,
Reginald Buckley, through his friendship with Rutland Boughton;
his second librettist, Wilfred Wilson Gibson was a personal
friend. Gibson wrote two 'choral humoreskes' for Bainton and
their element of imaginative fantasy produced some of his
most colourful music. By 1910 he had sketched ideas for a
work based on excerpts form Edward Carpenter's Song of
Democracy, a piece also set by Boughton. but it was not
until 1920 that these found their final form as A Song
of Freedom and Joy, published by Curwen in 1919 and premiered
in Newcastle that year. As the full scores of these three
works are missing it is impossible to give a full account
of the choral and orchestral texture.
Bainton's appearance at the Three Choirs Festival
of 1921 led to a commission from Dr.Percy Hull for a choral
work for the 1924 Festival. This was The Tower, to
words of Robert Nichols, setting the scene of The Last Supper;
it was completed on 17th September and published by Curwen;
its full score is now in the British Library. We are now entering
the greatest period of Bainton's work, and I would consider
this and the next two choral works, The Dancing Seal,
another humoreske of Gibson's and A Hymn to God the Father,
to words of John Donne, (his only overtly religious choral
work) to be three of his very finest works. Both were published
by Oxford University Press in 1925 and 1926. The Dancing
Seal might seem a little dated in its narrative today,
but the choral writing is brilliant and demanding, with intense
harmonic activity and wide range of tessitura, particularly
for the tenors. The scoring is clear and economical, but nevertheless
highly colourful and effective especially in the Debussyesque
middle section, a real fantastic rout. Compared to this A
Hymn seems almost a confession of sins! First performed at
the Worcester Festival in 1926, this is a short though effective
and dramatic piece, seemingly restrained in emotion yet deeply
powerful in sound. On the words "I have a sin of fear", the
choir divides into eight parts with a canonic avalanche of
one part after another; this builds to an imposing climax
for double choir with further additional parts and a final
tranquil ending. At under 10 minutes it is a very under-rated
work which deserves more frequent performance; both full scores
are now in the Mitchell Library, but copies are available
for study from the Edgar Bainton (UK) Society.
After this high point, Bainton left two more
choral works complete but unpublished; To the Name above
Every Name, to words of Richard Crashaw (1928), and The
Veteran of Heaven (Francis Thompson) of 1931, both in
the Mitchell library. It is not known if they were orchestrated,
perhaps by this time he was already looking towards a more
purely orchestral means of expression. During his summer holiday
in 1933 when he heard the news of his appointment to the New
South Wales Conservatorium, Bainton had been working on a
tone-poem based on Swinburne's Thalassa,- this was
put aside in the turmoil of moving to a new and exciting future.
During a holiday at Bundenoon in the Southern Highlands of
New South Wales in 1939, he took up the sketches once more
and expanded them into his Symphony no. 2 in D Minor which
received its premiere with the Sydney Symphony orchestra,
conducted by the composer, on September 11th 1941. It was
well received and Neville Cardus regarded the work as a tribute
to the apotheosis of a great period in English culture. It
consists of three main sections played without a break and
lasts 26 minutes. The opening chorale, played on a quartet
of horns against bass pizzicato, has a sense of anguish which
establishes the mood for the whole work. it gradually builds
up to a stormy climax, followed by an allegro section in a
rather windswept vein which then subsides into the mood of
the opening in the manner of a triumphal chorale which we
shall hear again at the end of the symphony. This is immediately
followed by a scherzo in a dotted 6/8 rhythm; the outline
of the theme used here is in slower tempo in the Trio and
is a reminder of the opening chorale of the symphony. There
is a famous family story connected with the extraordinarily
beautiful opening of the slow introduction to the Finale,
with its sustained strings in D major, its swirling woodwind
harmonies and ethereal flute theme. Bainton loved listening
to bird-song (hints of Messiaen?) and, during the holiday
at Bundenoon, heard the most ravishingly beautiful example
of this, but was unable to trace the elusive bird, much, to
his annoyance and that of his family who were dragged into
the adventure! This opening, a brief glimpse of heavenly light,
soon subsides as the basses begin to re-create the original
mood and the opening material which has bound the work together
from the start, returns.
This symphony, cleanly and colourfully scored,
is very accessible at first hearing, and yields up further
treasures on later experience. It deserves to be heard more
frequently in Britain, as it has been in Australia, with broadcasts
by various conductors over the last 35 years, including Joseph
Post, Myer Fredman and the composer himself. Its MS score
and parts are held by the ABC Federal Library at Sydney. It
is one of Bainton's most important works and there is still
more to come: the Symphony No. 3 in C Minor very nearly
remained unfinished. Bainton began it in 1952 and was working
on the slow movement in 1954 when his wife became ill and
died unexpectedly. His deep distress made him put the symphony
away and it was nearly forgotten. Gradually, however, with
the support of family and friends he came back to the work
and was finally able to release his anguish by completing
it. The last sixteen bars took months to satisfy his always
fastidious mind and the work was finished by 1956; he knew
it was amongst his very finest work and wrote nothing else
after it. He did not live to hear the premiere which was given
by the Sydney Symphony Orchestra under Sir Bernard Heinze
in 1957, a performance recorded and issued on the BROLGA label
(LP). Helen has described it as "a model of rich and immaculate
orchestration-almost Renoiresque in its searching out of orchestral
colour." 15 The harmonic language is more advanced
than the second symphony and the overall intensity and sense
of imaginative fantasy greater. The dawn-like opening chords,
molto adagio, have solos for woodwind and horns over sustained
strings which give way very quickly to a stormy allegro con
brio in which a rhythmical phrase from the bassoon is tossed
about among all the instruments and the movement progresses.
The tempo slows to andante with many interesting and beautiful
effects before changing to 12/8 time and gradually building
up to allegro vivace. Thereafter various sections are well
contrasted with each other and leads to a con fuoco passage
which dies away to the mood of the opening. The second movement
follows 'attacca' and is an allegretto grazioso described
by Helen as a "chuckling scherzo"'6, beginning
with a sequential theme on clarinet taken up by the flute.
The mood is still very much that of the first movement, indeed
this mood is sustained throughout the symphony. The pace slows
to molto piu lento with another theme on the clarinet, developed
with rich treatment until the shades of the first theme recur
in the strings. Everything becomes more animated again and
ends fortissimo. The slow movement has been described by the
writer and poet Franz Holford as Bainton's Sea Drift and
is a deeply emotional piece of writing, opening with a pensive
figure sounded on low strings, repeated on bass clarinet and
treated as a dialogue between strings, woodwind and horns.
Halfway through, a beautiful theme, marked tempo di pavane
is introduced by the strings; Helen remarks that her father
"makes the interesting experiment of scoring the violas at
an octave above the violins, to achieve a greater sonority'',16
but I maintain that Bainton knew full well what effect
he wished to achieve, having already done this in A Hymn
to God the Father when the violas and cellos sound out
an octave above the violins in the first section, 30 years
earlier. The last movement is built on "a heavily marked and
rhythmical motif in 3/2" with powerfully scored climaxes.
A poco lento section in 3/4 time is a good contrast in the
middle section and the melodic material has a pentatonic feel
to it. We also hear reminiscences from earlier material in
the symphony, and a noble and sonorous theme played towards
the conclusion by the strings, leads to the final climactic
molto maestoso, adagio, ending on a note of triumph.
Helen Bainton has described her father's Third
Symphony as "the epitome of his whole life and thought", and
with it, Bainton came to the end of a rich and fulfilled life
of music; a life in which he was constantly giving without
seeking for personal gain, and in which he strove to create
profound and beautiful expressions which he was content to
put aside for performance at some future time. As so much
of his most significant output remains in Australia, it has
only been possible to give a partial assessment here; furthermore,
the climate of opinion that has prevailed throughout this
century, with its obsession with materialism and scientific
progress, has seen fit to obscure the real value of the creative
artist as exemplified by Bainton and so many of his British
and continental contemporaries who represent a maturing of
tendencies. In 1990, the 110th Anniversary of his birth, we
should endeavour to take stock of what he, and they, have
left us, in order to enrich our understanding of a great and
glorious period of British and Western music of which, to
date, only a relatively small proportion has been uncovered.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Special acknowledgements to:
Miss Helen Bainton,
Mr Denis Dodds,
Professor David Tunley of Western Australia,
Dr Hans Forst, Australian Music Centre (Angela Lenehan),
Mitchell Library (Paul Brunton),
New South Wales Conservatorium Library (Claire McCoy)
ABC Federal Library (Daphne Maguire, Greg Nathan),
National Film and Sound Archive),
Bournemouth Music Library (W J S Date),
Newcastle Library (F W Manders),
Michael Hurd and the Rutland Boughton Trust,
British Library,
the late Lady Hull.
NOTES
1. Stanford, the Cambridge Jubilee and Tschaikovsky,
Gerald Norris (Publ. David and Charles, 1980 p. 545).
2. Musical Notes, (Ruhleben Musical Society)
pp. 48-9 courtesy Roger Noble.
3. Remembered on Waking, Helen Bainton (Currawong
Press, 1960 pp. 66-7).
4. ibid. pp 77-8.
5. ibid. p.41
6. Letter from Dr Hans Forst to the author,
March 9th, 1989.
7. Remembered on Waking pp 98-9.
8. ibid.
9. ibid. p. 38.
10. ibid. p. 91.
11. My Life of Music, Sir Henry Wood (Gollancz,
1938, p. 229).
12. Programme Note to the Bournemouth Municipal
Orchestra Symphony Concert No 4, October 1903, courtesy of
Bournemouth Music Library.
13. Remembered on Waking p.38.
14. The Reminiscences of Henry Coward (Curwen,
1919).
15. Helen Bainton-programme note for the 1957
premiere of the Third Symphony.
16. ibid.
