The
dual biography of English composer-poet
Ivor Gurney and musicologist-critic
Marion Scott (Ivor Gurney and Marion
Scott, Song of Pain and Beauty)
by Pamela Blevins will be issued The
Boydell Press on November 20th. AmazonUK
AmazonUS
This is the first biography of Gurney
in 30 years and the only biography of
Scott who was regarded as one of the
great scholars of her generation. Her
own significant contributions as a pioneering
music critic, musicologist, advocate
of contemporary music and women musicians
have been obscured by Gurney’s long
shadow so this new biography will bring
her into her own light.
Marion Scott was a visionary woman
and a pioneer in music criticism and
musicology, fields she helped open to
women. Like many gifted women she had
many options open to her in career choices
despite having been born in Victorian
England. Scott was fortunate in her
liberal parents, a father who was a
solicitor, talented pianist and metaphysician,
and a mother from an old Salem, Massachusetts
family of seafaring adventurers and
entrepreneurs. Like her ancestors Marion
was a risk taker who never considered
failure as an option. As a gifted young
violinist she dazzled audiences. At
19 she entered the Royal College of
Music where she studied violin with
Arbos and composition with Walford Davies
and later with Charles Villiers Stanford,
becoming one of his first female pupils
(not Rebecca Clarke as is often assumed
– Scott preceded her by a decade).
Marion inherited a strong business
sense from both parents and possessed
natural leadership abilities. She made
things happen. In 1906, she co-founded
the Royal College of Music Student Union
and served for many years as its secretary
(a position not unlike today's executive
directors). Two years later she formed
the Marion Scott Quartet (two men, two
women) as a vehicle to introduce contemporary
music to London audiences. During this
period she began to write for various
publications. One of her earliest extant
pieces from 1909 is a hard-hitting article
that tackled the realities of music
as a profession for women. Scott also
worked as a free lance violinist often
serving as concertmaster/leader with
orchestras (any dream of a solo career
was dashed when she was injured in a
near fatal accident that compromised
her health), free lance lecturer and
teacher. She arranged concerts, published
a volume of poetry and composed music.
Scott lived in the present but was
always looking into the future and for
ways of creating opportunities for both
women and men. From an early age she
worked with her activist parents in
various social reform movements -- suffrage,
temperance, rights for servants -- and
saw men and women working cooperatively
to achieve common goals. She applied
these lessons in her own life. Scott
understood the difficulties faced by
women in music; the loneliness of the
composer, the closed doors that stood
as barriers to women seeking careers
as instrumentalists, the lack of opportunities,
the silent destiny that seemed to be
a woman's fate. With the help of her
friends Katharine Eggar and Gertrude
Eaton she founded the Society of Women
Musicians in 1911 to promote cooperation
among women in different fields of music,
provide performance opportunities and
advice and to help women with the practical
business aspects of their work. Marion
insisted that the SWM have no political
agenda and that it be open to men as
associate members, a diplomatic move
that served the SWM very well. The SWM
became an influential voice in British
music and inspired women in other countries
to unite in their common goals.
After World War I, Scott began working
as the London music critic for the Christian
Science Monitor, a post she held for
14 years. During that period she wrote
for newspapers in England as well as
various journals, edited publications,
lectured and helped many young musicians
move forward with their careers. Her
writings form an unparalleled history
of music in Britain during the first
half of the 20th century. Scott's work
in musicology led her to become an internationally
respected authority on Haydn and to
write a classic metaphysical biography
of Beethoven that went into many editions
and is highly regarded today. Marion
Scott was a guiding light in reshaping
women’s roles in classical music and
in promoting and championing women and
contemporary music. Song of Pain
and Beauty restores her legacy and
introduces readers to a remarkable woman.
Pam Blevins
