H. Balfour Gardiner

The first study of the life and music of Balfour Gardiner (1877–1950), a generous patron of British music.

Stephen Lloyd (Author)

9780521619226, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 17 February 2005

292 pages
23.6 x 15.5 x 1.7 cm, 0.417 kg

This is the first study of the life and music of Balfour Gardiner (1877–1950), a composer of some distinction and a generous patron of British music. But it is necessarily more than the story of just one man: it is an account of many friendships (chiefly musical) during that exciting period of British music's struggle out of mediocrity to prominence. It was Balfour Gardiner who, before the First World War, launched in Queen's Hall a remarkable series of concerts that did much to establish the reputations of several young composers. It was he, too, who made possible in a war-torn England the first performance of Holst's The Planets, and who gave considerable assistance to his close friend Delius, the plight of whose last years forms a tragic undercurrent to this book. Stephen Lloyd brings to light for the first time the full story of this once greatly respected musician and benefactor. He has traced Gardiner's student days in Germany, his early struggles as a composer, his involvement first in the folk-song movement and later with the ill-fated Musical League, his extensive patronage of music, his dabbling in architecture, and his eventual forsaking of composition for afforestation, which proved an equally remarkable undertaking.

List of illustrations
Foreword Eric Fenby
Preface
1. One of the 'Frankfurt Group' 1877–1901
2. 'A civilised being …' 1902–1903
3. Hampshire folk-song collecting 1903–1906
4. Delius, Beecham and Hardy 1907–1911
5. ' … a place of enchantment' 1909–1911
6. 'Oriana will sing for me …' 1912–1913
7. 'Full of unexpected harmonies …' 1912–1914
8. 'The wasted years …' 1914–1919
9. Philharmonic patronage 1919–1922
10. 'None shall revive the flame that perisheth …' 1922–1924
11. 'My substituted occupation …' 1919–1927
12. 'If I might have two rows of trees …' 1927–1933
13. 'This is a terrible time …' 1934–1936
14. 'We are growing old …' 1937–1950
Appendix
Notes
Bibliography
Discography
Index.

Subject Areas: Individual composers & musicians, specific bands & groups [AVH]