Keith Humble, the Music-Maker with a Message

Iohn Whiteoak

Melbourne, and the international con- industrious, inventive stock, people who were good at temporary music community suffered a great loss on putting things together.6 Keith brought all of these I 23 May 1995 with the passing of Keith Humble: Aus- qualities, and more, to his own music-making. tralian , pianist, conductor, improviser, theo- Keithbeganhiseducation at Westgarth State School rist and founding Professor of the Department of Mu- (later Westgarth Central School) and went on to Uni- I sic, La Trobe University. Even though Keith received versity High School for a little over two years until he, the Order of Australia (AM) for services to Australian in his own words, 'dropped out' at fifteen years of age music in 1982, few Australians genuinely understand to pursue a musical career. Neither his primary nor his the significance of his contribution to contemporary secondary schooling provided him with any formal music, and this is not likely to occur until scholars music training. begin to assess his life's work from the enlightened Keith was an only child and his parents were a perspective of musical creativity that Keith himself cheerful, self-sacrificing couple who supported his promoted for more than three decades.l In this article, early career with every resource they could muster. As it is only possible to indicate something of the depth they were not musically inclined, Keith did not have and breadth of the musical knowledge, experience and the early exposure to musical culture commonly asso- expertise that Keith was able to offer Australian musi- ciated with outstanding musical careers. His two cal development and to survey a few aspects of his successive piano teachers, Miss Butcher and Miss life's work, his ideas and his opinions2 Only the Estcourt, were competent, conscientious, firm and very earlier, lesser known part of Keith's career is outlined supportive, but there was seemingly nothing excep- in any detail in order to allow discussion to extend tional about their teaching. While Keith showed an beyond a mere biographical sketch. What follows is a early aptitude for both music and sport, he was some- simple tribute toKeith, whom the respected Australian what disadvantaged in the former by his limited hand- composer and former Age critic, Felix Werder, once span and in the latter by his short stature. described as being 'without question the finest all- A clue to Keith's success is provided by his friend, round musician this country has produced since Percy colleague and former biographer, the late Laughton ~rain~er'.~ Harris. In a recent conversation, Harris described Keith was born in in 1927, on the eve of the Keith's most outstanding qualities as fearlessness, de- Great Depression and at the close of theexciting and termination and a refusal to compromise.7 It was relatively optimistic period known as the Australian probably the early appearance of these particular quali- Jazz Age. It was in the midst of the Depression that ties coupled with a deep sense of gratitude to his Leslie and Humble moved to with parents, teachers and others (mentioned below) that their son Keith where they settled in the working-class encouraged Keith to become a quite outstanding pian- suburb of Northcote. ist, even before leaving for England in late 1949. Keith's working-class and non-musical family back- From about nine years of age, he appears to have ground is sometimes commented upon.4 It should also entered as many piano contests as was humanly possi- be noted that until the Depression, the Humbles had a ble.8 At the end of 1943, he toured Tasmania billed as high social profile in Geelong and their achievements 'the Brilliant Boy Pianist' and shortly afterwards he form part of Victoria's history. The Humble Foundry passed his London College of Music Licentiate with in Geelong especially designed and built numerous 93%. His scrapbook of newspaper cuttings shows that machines, bridges and steam pumping engines to gov- in 1947 his first year at the Melbourne Conservatorium, ernment specifications. It manufactured Victoria's he was dux of the year, winning both the Ormond prize first refrigerator, its first wool press and its first motor and the Lady Turner prize. The following year he car. The founder of the family firm, William Humble, again won the Ormond prize, and also won the Open was the Mayor of Geelong in 1888, and one can find Concerto section of the South St Eisteddfod at Ballarat both a Humble Wharf and a Humble street in g eel on^.^ and the state-wide Royal Schools Scholarship. This Therefore in trying to understand the Humble phe- scholarship provided two years of free tuition at the nomenon, we should note that Keith was born of-at Royal Academy of Music, London. During 1949, his least on the Humble side of the family--determined, final year of study in Melbourne, he topped the Keith Humble. Director's 'score' for 'Nunique IV' (1969).

Context 10 (Summer 1995/96) Conservatorium honours list and won both the Wright An important manifestation of his exposure to big Prize and the State Government Plaque of Honour. band Swing was a later preference for types of improvi- In the 1949 State Finals of the A.B.C.'s Annual sation that were tightly framed within some form of Concerto and Vocal Competitions, his performance, predetermined structure. accompanied by the Victorian Symphony Orchestra, In the early 1950s, Keith moved from London to was rated well above that of all the other pianist Paris where his studies eventually led him to the con- entrant^.^ The recording of his performance of ductor, critic, composer and theorist, Ren6 Leibowitz, Khachaturian's Piano Concerto in Db major from this a former pupil of Webern. He subsequently worked as contest demonstrates the explosive intensity that Keith Leibowitz's assistant, copying parts, accompanying was able to bring to his playing.10 In addition to his and doing anything else required of him. At last he had many public performances, the people of Northcote set found his 'living composer'. Through Leibowitz in up a special public fund to assist his overseas studies. particular, he developed a lifelong passion for the This culminated in a farewell concert on 25 October elegance, discipline and logic of serialism. The most 1949 at the Melbourne Town Hall in which Keith important event of this period however, was the begin- performed with the 3DB Symphony Orchestra. Later, ning of a lifetime partnership with the talented pianist at the Royal Academy in London, he went against his Jill Dobson, whom he married in 1955.16 Without her piano teacher's advice and took the Academy's piano unfailing support, many of the events described below performance exam (L.R.A.M.) prematurely. He still probably could not have occurred. received 95% the highest mark seen there since the end In 1956, Keith returned to Melbourne to take up a of the war.11 position at the Melbourne Conservatorium. He ar- The intensity of this early performance background rived bursting with ideas and enthusiasm to contribute suggests why, later, he so consistently upheld the to Australian musical development. What he encoun- notions of the performer/composer and collaboration tered was a closed culture-an inward-looking com- between performer and composer, as opposed to that munity deaf to his ideas, music and general approach of the composer who works only with the notated to teaching. His return-of less than a year's dura- representation of sounds. tion-was a confidence-destroying disaster that forced Keith held a lifelong conviction that a continuum of his sudden departure to Europe, and from which he practice exists between improvisation and composi- took several years to recover. tion. This was undoubtedly also influenced by the fact Keith spent a considerable portion of the 1950s, that he was a jazz musician in the 1940s. As a teenager, both before and after his disappointing return to Aus- Keith-like his colleagues , Douglas Gamley tralia, touring Europe as an accompanist to vocalists and others-found jazz improvisation to be a useful such as Ethel Semser, John Riley and Robert Gartside, outlet for his creative urge. In the culturally isolated and also the cellist Marcel Hubert. His comprehensive Melbourne of the time, these musicians experienced collection of programs and review cuttings illustrates the impression that there were no living . To the astonishing amount of accompanying that he un- quote Keith, they felt that 'to be a composer you had to dertook in the 1950s, and suggests why he later main- be dead'.12 Keith did not draw a line between jazz and tained a connection with the lieder tradition, as both a other forms of improvisation. At the Conservatorium, composer and an accompanist.17 he was commended by Roy Shepherd among others The 1960s were the major turning point for Keith. for his non-jazz improvisation at the piano; at the same By 1960 he had fully recovered from his setback in time, he had also begun to improvise in the style of Australia and had also gained more experience as Bach to a jazz rhythm section with some of his jazz Leibowitz's assistant in various recording and teach- colleagues.13 Nevertheless, he enjoyed listening to ing projects. In 1960, Keith founded and began to direct and playing specific styles of jazz for their own sake. the Centre de Musique (CDM), a fluid collective of As a student, playing jazz also provided him with a performers and performer/composers based at the much needed source of income.14 American Center for Students and Artists in Paris.18 Keith arranged for and led groups such as his 1948 By the mid-1960s, the CDM had performed a remark- All Star Orchestra at Ziegfield's Palais, Hawthorn. He able spectrum of new music, including controversial also played in some of the leading palais bands of the music-theatre works by composers such as Guiseppi 1940s, including those led by Bob Gibson, Ian Holland Chiari. By 1968, many major figures in American and and Jack Liddle. In 1947, Australian Music Maker de- European contemporary and experimental music had scribed him as a 'sensation' with the Tommy Davidson either visited or had their works performed at the Orchestra, in which he had replaced Bernie Duggan, CDM. Keith had also collaborated with avant-garde one of Melbourne's best big band pianists of the time.l5 playwright Marc'O and produced scored/

6 Context 10 (Sunzmer 1995/96) improvisatory theatre music for his confrontational Grainger 'Centre' included an electronic music work- theatre works, L'En treprise (1963) and Prin temps (1964). shop and creative music sessions for children. His These brief comments fall far short of expressing intensive use of Grainger's building was also intended the uniqueness and significance of the CDM. The CDM to draw attention to the neglect that Grainger and his rivalled Pierre Boulez's famous Domaine Musical in ideas had suffered in Australia. Keith took every the performance of contemporary music and provided opportunity to promote the performance of Grainger's a forum for radical works that otherwise would have lesser-known works, such as The Warriors and Random remained unheard in Paris. It also provided perform- ~ound.~~ ance opportunities in Paris for works by Grainger, Don Keith became the acknowledged and controversial Banks and other Australians. However, the French leader of Melbourne's avant-garde, and from his first composer, performer, theorist and former CDM co- concert, he encountered savage criticism of his at- director, Jean-Charles Franqois, describes a much more tempts to promote new music. For example, in 'New significant function of Keith's concept: Music Has New Horrors', reviewer Linda Philips, her- self a composer, complained that the SPPNM's music: The greatness of Keith Humble's intuition in the '60s was to take full measure of the cata- seemed inspired from a mixture of machin- strophic disappearanceof the meaning of the ery sounds and the taking-off of an aero- 'masterpiece' and of the 'hero composer'. plane and very close to the more unpleasant Not only was he able to help us accept this noises of musique concrete ....[ It] included a fact of life, [he] was able to propose in very singer shrieking into the bowl of the grand practical terms the way to recovery from this piano, groans, thuds, and squeaks and eve- illness.19 rything but-music.23

Keith had seen the calcified musical environment The most controversial aspect of Keith's activities that he had encountered in Australia in 1956 as partly was his creation and direction of music-theatre works the result of the over-centralisation of musical author- such as the Ntinique (music for now) series (1968- ;see ity around the notion of 'the conservatorium'. The p.4) and the multi-media work La Ligende (1970). He CDM provided a dynamic alternative model based on was also savaged by the critics for his direction of, or creative exchange and a receptiveness to new ideas collaboration in, the production of other music-theatre and ways of doing things. works such as Franqois' Zootoo, Chiari's Teatrino and During his time in Paris, Keith had also begun to Dieter Schnebel's Glossolalie. At the same time, he visit theU.S.A. to perform and lecture. On his 1964 trip, continued to perform, conduct and promote less con- he also visited Melbourne and gave a workshop to an troversial items in the contemporary music repertoire enthusiastic group of musicians who, shortly after this, including works by Webern, Schonberg, Bart6k and formed a Melbourne branch of the International Soci- Stockhausen. ety for Contemporary Music (ISCM).~~During this His activities in 1969 alone, the year he was joined short visit to Melbourne he promoted some of the in Melbourne by his CDM colleague, Fran~ois,amount concepts he was working with at the CDM such as to an astonishing explosion of activity and creativity: 'spontaneous composition' and the breaking down of staging and performingin several music-theatre works; barriers between performers and audience.21 direction of the ABC Contemporary Music Workshop In 1966, Keith returned to Melbourne from Paris to series; working to establish a private radio station to take up a position as Senior Lecturer in Composition at promote new music; staging and/or performing in the Conservatorium. One of his first activities was to numerous new musicconcerts; and writing seven pieces establish the Society for the Private Performance of of the Arcade series, including the symphonic work New Music (SPPNM) at the Grainger Museum. Keith Arcade 5. This is not to mention his teaching, conduct- always referred to it as the Grainger Centre because he ing, electronic music activities, committee work and wanted Grainger's building to be a living centre of preparation for a visiting professorship in the USA.~~ creative action, not a museum. Many Australians have had direct experience of By this time, the Melbourne branch of the ISCM was Keith Humble the performer, composer, conductor, well established and was already showing some signs teacher or theorist, particularly after he established the of conservatism. The SPPNM therefore provided a Department of Music at La Trobe University in 1974. forum for some of the more radical young 'outsiders' in Keith's better known overseas achievements after 1970 the Melbourne new music community, such as Barry include his professorship at the University of Califor- McKimm, Syd Clayton, Robert Rooney and Clive nia, San Diego (1971-74), his association with its fa- O'Comell. Other activities established by Keith at the mous Centre for Musical Experiment, his membership

Keith Humble, the Music-Maker with a Message of the international improvising ensemble KIVA (1982- ity. For example, while informed intuition was an 90) and, after 1989, his consultancy to the European integral element of his approach to creativity, he also Community's New Music Literacy Program. Impor- worked for more than forty years to develop a specific tant amongst his many Australian achievements was theoretical and practical approach to musical composi- his co-founding and direction (1975-78) of ACME, tion. His theory, which is outlined in a statement (Australian Contemporary Music Ensemble). ACME written shortly before his death, is expressed in his provided the prototype and the impulse for later con- Symphony of Sorrozos (1994), which will probably be temporary ensembles such as Flederman and Pipeline. seen as his most important fully notated work. While Before concluding with some comments about Keith considered his theory to be still at an embryonic Keith's significance to music in Australia, it is impor- stage of development, he believed that it was of land- tant to mention something about his approach to crea- mark importance for Western contemporary composi- tivity. Keith had a special interest in process-the idea tion.28 of music-making as action rather than as product- In attempting to summarise Keith's overall signifi- which shaped his work and his influence on others. To cance to Australian music, the most important thing to understand the significance of his concern for process, be said is that he was a visionary.29 He returned to it is useful to consider his frequent claim that all his Australia from Europe in 1956 with a vision for con- works were 'frozen improvisations'.25 Keith recog- temporary music which was not acceptable in the nised a number of improvisatory processes which had Melbourne of that time. Only a few years later, that influenced his approach to musical creativity by the vision found acceptance in Paris and America. He mid-1960s. These can be categorised as follows: returned to Australia from Europe again in 1966 with 1.The intuitive organisation of material within 'closed' a still clearer vision for Australian musical develop- systems: ment, backed by his European success, maturity, a (a) The spontaneous realisation of internalised wealth of practical experience and a degree of support formulae in performance. This ceased to interest Keith from his employers, the after the 1940s. Conservatorium. This time he did have some impact (b) The spontaneous organisation of internalised on Australia's musical culture.

I paradigms: thenotion that a fixed system (e.g. serialism) By the 1970s however, the personal cost of pursuing I I can be internalised to the degree that composing on a vision that was rejected by the dominant grouping in I paper virtually becomes the transcription of sound Australian music began taking its toll on Keith. Again relationships as they unfold conceptually. he found that Americans-namely his colleagues at 1 2. More exploratory or 'open' processes: the University of California, San Diego-were eager to (a) Creative interaction: the process by which a grasp all that lie had to offer. He returned to Australia work is created or modified by a director/ensemble or from the USA in 1974 with even more experience and collective interaction. enthusiasm, and this time succeeded in setting up a @) The intuitive, but highly informed, juxtaposi- progressive Music Department at La Trobe University tion or layering of sound complexes (textures, sound that could embody and project his vision through its masses, genres, media, et~.).~~ staff and graduates. This last process-intuitive juxtaposition and lay- The vision for Australian music which Keith worked ering--can also be observed on a greatly expanded so hard to project was based on a number of strong scale in the unfolding process of Keith's own musical personal convictions, of which the following were and intellectual life. His entire creative output repre- particularly important. Keith believed that the art of sents an ongoing exploration of possibilities for music, others must be trusted, even if its meaning is not or music education. Thus individual experimental immediately apparent. He also believed that the locus projects superseded each other, overlapped or un- for artistic interaction should alway be 'a place of folded concurrently. In the case of music, each exten- conflict1-an exciting, turbulent artistic environment sion of an individual project was generally marked by in which musical dogma was challenged and new a one-off outcome, or 'frozen improvisation', which ideas could emerge. Most importantly, he believed summarised that stage of the project. Each project and that 'composing' should be about music-making- individual work-in-progress also generated 'raw ma- about people becoming involved in the whole process terial' which, in turn, was recycled for use in the of making music happen-not just writing music. extension of that particular project, aconcurrent project, or as the basis of, or for use in, an entirely new project.27 Keith Humble drew much. inspiration from the A special characteristic of Keith's creativity was his work of an important but little-known French poet, ability to work in seemingly opposite modes of activ- playwright and theorist, Pierre Albert-Birot, who died

8 Context 10 (Summer 1995/96) in 1967,just asKeith had begun his often lonely crusade transcription of De Berg Tape 417:1, p.5. l2'Keith Humble', transcription of De Berg Tape 417:1, p.2. for musical enlightenment in Australia. One of the l3 Taped Interview, Whiteoak/Keith Humble, 6 June 1986. characters invented by Birot is Larountala, the messen- l4For further discussion of Keith's Melbourne jazz context ger who was destroyed because he was misunder- see John Whiteoak, 'Australian Approaches to Improvisatory stood. This character had special significance for Keith Musical Practice, a Melbourne Perspective: 1836-197O1,Ph.D. thesis, La Trobe University, 1993, pp.479-99. and the melancholy spectre of Larountala emerges in 15 Alrstralian Mlrsic Maker, 20 February 1947, p.28. many of his w0rks.~0 The parallel between Birot's l6 They were close friends in Melbourne before 1950 and character and Keith is obvious. Keith touched the lives married in August 1955. l7 Keith's collection of programs and review cuttings are of many of Australia's most creative and productive held by Jill Humble. The preliminary catalogue of Humble's musicians of the last three decades. Yet in many ways original scores prepared by Jill Humble and myself lists he remains-in Australia-the messenger who was twelve songs written between 1949 and 1989. misunderstood. It is hoped that Australians will now A partial account of the CDM is presented in Nelcya Delanoe, Le Raspail Vert, L'American Cerzter A Paris 1934-1994: make a belated attempt to understand Keith's ideas une Histoire des Avant-Gardes Franco-Amiricaines (Paris: and, more importantly, his music. Seghers, 1994), pp.69-109. l9'In Memoriam Keith Humble', a tribute delivered by Jean- Charles Franqois at the Keith Humble Memorial Concert, Notes NorthcoteTown Hall, 16 July 1995, and accepted for publica- An important aspect of this perspective is discussed in John tion under the same title in Perspectives of Nezu Music 33.2 McCaughey, 'Notes on Contemporary Music', MUM (1995). See also James Murdoch, Australia's Contemporary (Melburne University Magazine) 1970, pp.45-49. Composers (Melbourne: Macmillan, 1972), p.123. 2This article is the redrafted version of an untitled tribute to 2o The Melbourne branch was formed by early 1965. See Keith presented to the University of Melbourne, Faculty of 'Music', Farrago, April 1965, p.8. Music Centennial Conference on 7 June 1995, in place of the 21 See Kenneth Hince, 'Concert in the Round', Alrstralian, 24 scheduled paper, 'Keith Humble: A Voice for International- October 1964, p.15. I ism or a Broader Vision for Australian Music?'. While source z2 Shortly after Keith's return, Felix Werder wrote that 'even references are provided, the article draws on a much wider the sleepy Museum awakened to the I array of sources than it is possible to indicate here. These Humbelian kiss of modernism and produced from its dark- includea decade of informal discussions with Keith about his ened corners all sorts of odd percussion instruments restored life and work. by loving student hands to their former glories'. 'A Talent I 'We Give Our Artists Great Farewells', Age [Melbourne],21 Returns', Age, 3 December 1966, p.22. Also see Whiteoak, I July 1973, p.19. 'Australian Approaches to Improvisatory Musical Practice', I Humble describes this background in 'Keith Humble', De 552-60. Berg Tape 417:l transcription, National Library of Australia, gfi~i~~[Melbourne], 13 September 1966, p.13. 1969, p.1. 24~atafrom Keith Humble's programs and reviews for 1969 5~ee'William Humble' in JamesSmith ed., The Cyclopedia of held by Jill Humble. Victoria (Melbourne: Cyclopedia Company, 1903-05),p.462. 25 Discussed in John Whiteoak, 'Interview with Keith Hum- Taped interview, Whiteoak/Keith Humble, 6 June 1986. ble', New Mirsic Articles 7 (1989), pp.21-26. ~ccordin~to Jill Humble, however, Keith's mother, Victo- 26 Laughton Harris also noted relationships between certain ria, was the industrious determined onein Keith'simmediate of Keith's works and projects, for example, '...the tendency family. Personal communication, Whiteoak/Jill Humble, forsmallerworks togerminate from larger works-in-progress, Geelong, 25 August 1995. or works just completed...'. Laughton Harris, 'Keith Hum- Telephone conversation, Whiteoak/Laughton Harris, 6 ble', in F. Callaway & D. Tunley, eds., A~rstralia~lCompositiorz June 1995. in the Tzuerltietll Centlrry (Melbourne:Oxford University Press, 8~hedata presented on Keith's early pianistic achievements 1978), p.121. is extracted from his collection of 1930s and 1940s examina- 27 Whiteoak, 'Australian Approaches to Improvisatory Mu- tion and contest results, comments and certificates, and an sical Practice', pp.567-88. unpaginated scrapbookof mostly undated, unidentified press 28 Keith's handwritten statement and the documentation cuttings. These documents are currently held by Jill Humble relating to the research and development of a compositional as part of the Humble estate, but I hold photocopies of all the system based on this theory is held by Jill Humble as part of programs, cuttings and other documentation referred to in the Keith Humble Estate. These documents will be dupli- this article. cated for the Humble Research Collection. A La Trobe The other pianists are listed as Ronald [Farren-] Price, Max postgraduate student, Tony Hughes, has already begun to Cooke and Alison Linden. Keith was narrowly beaten by the study this theory. violinist, Donald Weekes. 'Victorian Concerto Finalists' in 29 Telephone conversation, Whiteoak/Harris, 6 June 1995. Alrstralintl M~lsicolNews and Digest, n.d. This aspect of Keith is also strongly emphasised in Franqois' lo The original acetate records are held by Jill Humble but 'In Memoriam Keith Humble'. they have been duplicated for the Keith Humble Research 3O Whiteoak, 'Australian Approaches to Improvisatory Mu- Collection currently being established at the Department of sical Practice', pp.583-87. Music, La Trobe University. Reported in 'Paris for Brilliant Pianist', unidentified cut- ting in the Humble scrapbook. See also 'Keith Humble',

Keith Humble, the Music-Maker zuitll a Message 9