Two Berkeley Professors: Arthur Bliss and Albert Elkus

N. WILLIAM SNEDDEN

- ARTICLE -

N. William Snedden Independent

1. The Early Years in California: 1923-25

Introduction Arthur Bliss’s first visit to the USA as a young man of 31 took place in April 1923, accompanying his American father Francis, step-mother Ethel, and their children Enid, Cynthia, and Patrick. They sailed from Southampton to New York on the SS Aquitania; by coincidence Gustav Holst was also on board. Francis, aged 75, wanted to return to the place of his birth before re-settling with Ethel on the Pacific coast in Santa Barbara.1 For many years Francis had directed the Anglo-American Oil Company of John D. Rockefeller in London. Upon arrival in America the Bliss family stayed in Manhattan with Francis’s cousin Lorenzo Daniels, a wealthy merchant.2 From 1923 till 1931 Arthur journeyed to the USA on alternate years (see Table 1.1), staying with his father at 15 School House Road ‘Paradero’ in Montecito, Santa Barbara. Situated close by was ‘Casa Dorinda’, the famous 80-roomed mansion estate of William Henry Bliss (no relation), completed in 1919 and named after William’s wife Anna Dorinda Bliss (née Blaksley). The likes of Paderewski, Heifetz and Mischa Elman gave recitals there, including Arthur and the tenor Lawrence Strauss in a performance for Anna Bliss in October 1924. Francis was an avid and sophisticated art collector (as was Arthur), acquiring works by Manet and Zorn. He also held a large collection of etchings by the French painter Alphonse Legros (1837-1911) and by the ‘cowpuncher artist’ John Edward Borein (1872-1945).3 In common with H. G. Wells, Francis appreciated the British

1 TWO BERKELEY PROFESSORS: ARTHUR BLISS AND ALBERT ELKUS watercolourist Frank Morley Fletcher (1866-1949) who was director of the Santa Barbara School of the Arts from 1924 till 1930.

Table 1: Ship passenger records for Sir Arthur Bliss 1923-1941 Sources: &

From To Ship Arrival Particulars Two years of travel between New York, Boston, Philadelphia, San

27 Apr Francisco, and Santa Barbara; Southampton New York Aquitania 1923 married Trudy Hoffmann on 1 1 June 1925

27 Jun New York Southampton Orbita Married couple return to England 1925

Three months, initially at Lake Mohonk (NY), moving on to Santa

30 May Barbara presenting Barbara Liverpool New York Cedric 1927 (daughter) to her grandfather, 2 Francis

27 Aug New York Plymouth Carmania Bliss family return to England 1927

4 Aug Liverpool New York Adriatic One month at Lake Mohonk (NY) 1929 3 9 Sep New York Liverpool Albertic Bliss family return to England 1929 4 Aug Southampton New York Olympic Two months in Santa Barbara 4 1931 9 Oct New York Southampton Majestic Bliss family return to England 1931 Three months initially, later extended to two years due to

onset of WW II. Travels between 4 Jun Southampton New York Georgic New York, Stockbridge, 1939 Moosehead Lake ME, Boston, 5 Chicago, and Berkeley

Bliss returns to England alone,

via Toronto and Montreal, taking Bristol 30 Jun Québec Bayano up his appointment as Director of Avonmouth 1941 Overseas Music at BBC

2 N. WILLIAM SNEDDEN

Bliss’s name appeared in the press shortly before his arrival in America, with The New York Clipper reporting he had agreed to join the board of the newly formed League of Composers.4 The paper also announced a series of concerts for the 1923-24 season devoted to works from various nations to be given by the League at the Klaw Theatre in mid-town New York. Bliss soon found himself in quite an awkward position as guest at the welcome reception organised by the League where he learned members of the rival International Composers’ Guild (ICG) had regarded him as having joined the ranks of the ‘enemy’.5 Apart from this, the reception party given at the MacDowell Club of New York City was a very pleasant affair, with the young and wealthy present dancing to a set of waltzes improvised by the pianist Harold Bauer on themes from Wagner operas. In his address before the League, Bliss stated he was going to California with his father where he was ‘planning some interesting musical experiments with film’ but would be returning to New York in the autumn to conduct two of his compositions.6 Bliss was interviewed at length for the Pacific Coast Musical Review, resulting in an article published on 1 September 1923. In this, Bliss is quoted as saying that America had impressed him sufficiently to write an ‘American Symphony’, remarking ‘it will not be a bit romantic, but will have to do with machinery, with America as a modern country’. He presented the interviewer (unnamed) with a booklet on his Colour Symphony written by Percy Scholes.7 Bliss was also in Los Angeles for a few days around this time to hear Hollywood Bowl concerts and to see Charlie Chaplin and Douglas Fairbanks with the aim of writing music for the screen, as previously mentioned. However, Chaplin was out of town and Fairbanks ‘as hard to reach as the Emperor of China’.8 Another article worth highlighting is about the promotion of a song recital given on 9 October 1923 at the St. Francis Hotel, San Francisco, by the English cellist May Muckle and the Californian tenor Lawrence Strauss. Bliss’s romantic song The Hare, written in 1921 is listed on the programme along with songs by Ravel, Milhaud, Massenet, Richard Strauss, Gabrielle Grovlez, Arnold Bax

3 TWO BERKELEY PROFESSORS: ARTHUR BLISS AND ALBERT ELKUS

(I Heard a Piper Piping), and Eugène Goossens (Chanson de Barberine). Importantly, the article states: Interesting numbers by Arthur Bliss, brilliant young Englishman, who will make his debut as guest conductor with the Boston Symphony conducting his greatly discussed ‘Color [sic] Symphony’, will soon be presented, and whose talks at the University of California this summer were illustrated by Lawrence Strauss.9

So it appears Bliss lectured in California as early as 1923 and, undoubtedly, he met up at this time with his good friend the composer and teacher Professor Albert Elkus, later Chair of the Music Department at the Figure 1: Bliss giving a lesson to Helen Goodfield at the Recreation Center, Santa Barbara. University of

Image reproduced from California Southland, 8:64 (April 1925). California, Berkeley. On 21 October 1924 Bliss wrote to his friend Ulric Nisbet in England, remarking ‘I have a quaint appointment here [in Santa Barbara] as Director of Music [of the Community Arts Association] which may keep me here for several years’. This was indeed true for (as can be seen from Table 2 below) during his early sojourn to California, Bliss had a full calendar of cultural engagements extending to early May 1925.

4 N. WILLIAM SNEDDEN

Table 2: Arthur Bliss Pacific Coast Music Calendar October 1923 – May 1925 Compiled by Snedden, acknowledging Pacific Coast Musical Review Vols. 44-47 and California Southland Nos. 59-65 as the principal source material.

Date Venue Performers Programmatic information Blanche Rogers Lott (piano) and members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra: Sylvain Noack Gamut Club, • Conversations (violin), Emile Ferir (viola), Chamber Music • Madam Noy Ilya Bronson (cello), Henri Society, Los • Mozart Trio in E-flat 26 October de Busscher (oboe), Andre Angeles. major, K.498 1923 Maquarre (flute), Pierre First of a series Perrier (clarinet), Alfred • Beethoven Quintet Op. of twelve Brain (French horn), 16 programmes Frederick Morritz (bassoon), Alfred Kastner (harp), and Monnie Hayes Hastings (soprano) Lillian Gustafson (soprano), • Madam Noy 11 Lenox Quartet, and Klaw Theatre, • The Women of Yueh November members of the NY New York City (world premiere) 1923 Philharmonic Orchestra, Arthur Bliss (conductor) • Rout • Ballads of the Four Seasons • The Buckle (from Three Romantic Songs) • Songs arranged by Constant van der Wal & Philharmonic Eva Gauthier (mezzo- 25 February Paul Selig Auditorium, Los soprano),11 Arthur Bliss 192410 Angeles (piano) • Jazz numbers: Alexander’s Ragtime Band (Berlin), Carolina in the Morning (Donaldson), Innocent Ingenue Baby & Swanee (Gershwin) 14th Annual State • Unspecified ‘Trio’ played Convention of Henry Eichheim, Ethel Roe on foreign instruments 30 June-4 Music Teachers’ Eichheim, Arthur Bliss (part of Henry July 1924 Association of (instrumentation Eichheim’s lecture California, Santa unspecified) ‘Some Impressions of Barbara Oriental Music’)

5 TWO BERKELEY PROFESSORS: ARTHUR BLISS AND ALBERT ELKUS

• Colour Symphony (final movement) • Set of Act-tunes and Dances (Henry Purcell, arr. for String Orchestra Los Angeles Philharmonic by Bliss) Orchestra, Arthur Bliss • Gluck Iphigenia in Aulis 23 August Hollywood Bowl, (guest conductor) overtureAH 1924 Los Angeles Alfred Hertz (conductor), • Léon Boëllmann Alfred Wallenstein (cello) Variations Symphoniques, Op. 23AH • Dvorak Symphony No. 9, Op. 95 ‘New World’AH

(AH denotes works conducted by Alfred Hertz) Miss Ida G. Scott’s Illustrated lecture on ‘Vitality “Fortnightlys” and Importance of Colonial Ballroom 6 October Contemporary European – St. Francis Arthur Bliss (lecturer) 1924 Music’. Bliss played piano Hotel, San works by Vaughan Williams & Francisco Eugène Goossens. The first of ten events late October Community Arts Lawrence Strauss (tenor), Songs by Debussy, Émile 1924 Association of Arthur Bliss (piano) Pessard, Émile Palidilhe, Santa Barbara, El German Romantic ballads, Paseo closing with Bliss’s The Hare. Fortnightly Pops 8 November Community Arts Community Arts Chorus and ‘Mr. Bliss will entertain the 1924 Association of an ensemble, Arthur Bliss Western Division Conference Santa Barbara, El (director) of the Playground and Paseo Recreation Association of America’ 9 November Ditto Performer details unknown Programme of music for two 1924 pianos. Details unknown. 1 December Ditto Henry Eichheim (violin), • Goossens Sonata in E 1924 Chamber music Ethel Roe Eichheim (piano) minor (Arthur Bliss - recital pianist) • Varacini Sonata in E minorERE • Debussy Sonata in G minorERE

(ERE denotes works which include Ethel Roe Eichheim as performer) 6 N. WILLIAM SNEDDEN

20 Community Arts Arthur Bliss (director) Children’s concert December Association of 1924 Santa Barbara, Lobero Theatre 1-2 January Los Angeles Civic Arthur Bliss (speaker) All-Southern California Music 1925 Music and Art and Drama Conference Association 3 January Community Arts Arthur Bliss (speaker) First of a series of talks on 1925 Association of music for pupils of the School Santa Barbara, of the Arts in Santa Barbara 936 Santa Barbara Street 10 January Community Arts Arthur Bliss (director) Children’s concert 1925 Association of Santa Barbara, Recreation Center 17 January Community Arts Arthur Bliss (speaker) Lecture on program of 1925 Association of Philharmonic concert given at Santa Barbara, Granada Theatre Lobero Theatre 18 January Community Arts Arthur Bliss (director) Pop concert (content 1925 Association of unspecified) Santa Barbara, Lobero Theatre 1 February Community Arts Arthur Bliss (speaker) Lecture on program of 1925 Association of Philharmonic concert given at Santa Barbara, Granada Theatre on Feb 2 Lobero Theatre 6-7 February Miss Ida G. ditto Illustrated lecture titled ‘The 1925 Scott’s Symphony and Early “Fortnightlys” Symphonists, romantic Armstrong School period’. of Business Auditorium Berkeley, repeated next day in Native Sons Building, San Francisco 13-14 Hollywood Bowl, Los Angeles Philharmonic • Mêlée Fantasque February Los Angeles Orchestra, Arthur Bliss • Purcell-Bliss Set of Act- 1925 (guest conductor) tunes and dances 15 February Community Arts Arthur Bliss (director) Pop concert (content 1925 Association of unspecified) Santa Barbara, Lobero Theatre

7 TWO BERKELEY PROFESSORS: ARTHUR BLISS AND ALBERT ELKUS

21 February Community Arts Arthur Bliss (speaker) Talk on Mendelssohn for 1925 Association of pupils of the School of the Santa Barbara, Arts in Santa Barbara 936 Santa Barbara Street 1 March Community Arts ditto Lecture on program of 1925 Association of Philharmonic concert to be Santa Barbara, given at Granada Theatre on Lobero Theatre Mar 2 2 March Miss Ida G. Lawrence Strauss (tenor), • Three Jolly Gentlemen 1925 Scott’s Lajos Fenster (violin), and (Bliss premiere) “Fortnightlys” Ada Clement (piano) • Bloch Violin Sonata No. 1 Colonial Ballroom • Solo piano works – St. Francis (unspecified) Hotel, San • Songs by Ravel, Charles Francisco Griffes & Cyril Scott Final Recital 3 March Community Arts Arthur Bliss (conductor) & Chamber works by Bliss 1925 Association of members of the Los (Conversations) and Henry Santa Barbara, Angeles Philharmonic Eichheim (Quartet for Stringed Lobero Theatre Orchestra: Sylvain Noack, Instruments, 1895, and Henry Sverdrofsky, and Malay Mosaic, 1924) Morris Stoloff (violins), Emile Ferir (viola), Ilya Bronson (cello), Ernest Huber (bass), Andre Maquarre, Jay Plowe (flutes), Henri de Busscher (oboe), O. W. Hoffman (cor- anglais), and Alfred Kastner (harp). Ethel Roe Eichheim performed as pianist in Malay Mosaic, conducted by Henry Eichheim. 15 March Community Arts Arthur Bliss (director) Pop concert (content 1925 Association of unspecified) Santa Barbara, Lobero Theatre 21 March Community Arts Arthur Bliss (speaker) Talk on Beethoven for pupils 1925 Association of of the School of the Arts in Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara 936 Santa Barbara Street 12 April Community Arts Arthur Bliss (director) Pop concert (content 1925 Association of unspecified) Santa Barbara, El Paseo

8 N. WILLIAM SNEDDEN

24-26 April Community Arts ditto Band concerts Saturday 25 1925 Association of April – afternoon and evening Santa Barbara, Spring Flower Festival, City Hall Plaza 1-2 May Community Arts ditto Special Festival Performances 1925 Association of of Mendelssohn’s Elijah Santa Barbara, Lobero Theatre

2. Albert Elkus

A brief encounter In his autobiography, Bliss mentions that he first met the composer and teacher Albert Elkus in San Francisco during his inaugural US trip. However, the two men were briefly acquainted in England at least two years earlier during 1921.12 Elkus reported back to the Pacific Coast Musical Review on a number of musical events he attended in London, including an orchestral concert during July 1921 organised by the British Music Society. Under its auspices there was a conference that month enquiring into the public’s comparative indifference to contemporary art and the Society were weighing up the advantages and disadvantages of a closer union between the various arts. In a second report, Elkus found the London concert hall schedule confusing and he arrived late for an all-British music programme, missing the overture from Joseph Holbrooke’s opera The Children of Don (1911).13 Elkus’s editorial sketch covers a remarkable line-up of English composers whose works he was hearing for the first time: Vaughan Williams’s The Lark Ascending (‘disappointing’ wrote Elkus), Eugène Goossens’s The Eternal Rhythm (‘a work of substance and genuineness’), Cyril Scott’s Piano Concerto No. 1 (‘I have neither the patience nor the vocabulary to voice my disgust at the fluent dilettantism’), and Arthur Bliss’s Concerto for Piano, Tenor, Strings and Percussion.14 Elkus found a great deal of strength in Bliss’s composition but considered the tenor part as ‘needless and unnatural’, unlike the 9 TWO BERKELEY PROFESSORS: ARTHUR BLISS AND ALBERT ELKUS women’s wordless chorus in the last movement of Holst’s The Planets which he described as ‘the gem of the concert, the most impressive piece of British music I have ever heard’. The brief encounter which followed this remarkable musical event spawned a singular friendship between Bliss and Elkus which would endure for over forty years. Elkus - A leading musician and teacher Albert Elkus came from a distinguished family of prominence in music, commerce and public life in Sacramento, California, where he was born in 1884. His mother Bertha Kahn was a pianist originally from New York, and his father Albert a reforming mayor of Sacramento. Elkus graduated BLitt (1906) and MLitt (1907) from the University of California (UC) Berkeley. Trained by his mother from childhood, he studied from 1894 till 1906 with Hugo Mansfeldt in Sacramento and Oscar Weil in San Francisco, and then privately abroad, periodically from ca. 1908 till 1914, working with Harold Bauer in Paris and with the Russian pianist Josef Lhévinne in Berlin.15 His teachers in composition included Georg Schumann in Berlin, and Robert Fuchs and Carl Prohaska in Vienna, where he also studied conducting with Franz Schalk (later a director of the Vienna State Opera jointly with Richard Strauss).16 In 1915 he joined the Jenkins’ School of Music in Oakland and in January 1917 was elected a director of the Music Teacher’s Association of California. From 1921 up until his death in 1962 Elkus held a long series of academic posts, including: head of music theory at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music (1923-25, 1930- 37); teacher in music theory and composition at Dominican College, San Rafael (1924-31); as well as lecturer in music and instructor in piano at Mills College, Oakland, California (1929-44). He joined the music faculty at UC Berkeley in 1931, becoming conductor of the UC Symphony Orchestra in 1934, Professor of Music in 1935 and Chair of the Department in 1937, a post he held until reaching retirement in 1951.

10 N. WILLIAM SNEDDEN

Professor Elkus had a great a love of music from the Classical and Romantic eras, including composers such as Beethoven (whom he revered), Brahms, and Wagner. Elkus was a distinguished composer in his own right, writing many piano, chamber, and vocal works, including: a Violin Sonata (started in 1900 and completed in Berlin during 1914); and I Am the Reaper for men’s chorus and piano (1921). Among his most successful orchestral works are: Impressions from a Greek Tragedy (1917), which later won the Juilliard Publication Prize in November 1935; a Concertino for Cello, String Orchestra and Timpani (1921) and Rondo On a Merry Folk Tune for Small Orchestra (1923).17 Portrait of Elizabeth Elkus Florence Elizabeth Britton (1902-94), was born and raised in London by working- class parents from Bethnal Green. Moving to America aged 24, she married Albert in 1929. Elizabeth was a school teacher and an active suffragist in her youth, closely involved with child-welfare issues and handicapped children.18 She was interviewed at the age of ninety during 1993 by Caroline Crawford as part of an archival project which preserves the oral history of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.

3. The Pacific Coast Dream

A standing invitation Letters between Bliss and Elkus, including correspondence from Trudy to Elizabeth, date from ca. 1938 till 1962. There are also a dozen or so letters relating to Elkus’s first son, Jonathan. A brief letter from Bliss dated July 20th (no year) sent from East Heath Lodge reads: Dear Elkus, I hope something comes of this. I greatly enjoyed seeing you both to-day. Yours ever sincerely, AB.

11 TWO BERKELEY PROFESSORS: ARTHUR BLISS AND ALBERT ELKUS

Clearly, Elkus and his wife met up with Bliss during a visit to England, but the precise dates and what this cryptic reply alludes to is a matter of conjecture. Another letter partially dated November 24th (again from Hampstead, no year) signed Arthur Bliss reads: Dear Albert, Thank you for your letter. I met [Pierre] Monteux at lunch and we were talking about you the other day.19 He wanted me if I were writing to you to give you his cordial greetings. The March from the Film Music ‘Things to Come’ is issued in piano edition and commercial orchestration ... The full score will later be issued by Novello who now control the orchestral rights of the whole suite.

Elkus and his wife were in England from June to August 1930 to meet Elizabeth’s parents (following their marriage in December 1929) and again during the summer of 1938, this time with their sons, Jonathan and Benedict. During the latter visit Albert studied some of Beethoven’s sketchbooks in the British Museum Library and he took Bliss with him one day to show and discuss his findings.20 Given these details, it is highly likely that Bliss’s two letters cited above both relate to the year 1938. Of more relevance and interest here, however, is that in the longer second letter Arthur declares ‘I still toy idly with the dream of coming out to the Pacific Coast next year [1939] - but it still remains a dream.’21 His wish would soon come true, for Elkus met Bliss at a Carnegie Hall concert on 10 June 1939, and again urged his friend to take up his long-standing invitation to teach in America as a visiting professor. Building the World of Tomorrow During the British Week at the New York World’s Fair in June 1939, two concerts sponsored by the British Council were presented at Carnegie Hall.22 Bliss travelled from Southampton to New York along with Sir Adrian Boult and Léon Goossens. Bliss gives the ship name as Carmania in his autobiography, but it was in fact the Cunard White Star Line MV Georgic. (Bliss sailed on the Carmania in August 1927). The Georgic ship manifest lists Arthur as ‘Composer Member of the British Council’

12 N. WILLIAM SNEDDEN and ‘Diplomat’ along with Trudy, Barbara and Karen - the two children also listed as Diplomats. The first concert, on 9 June, featured the American premiere of Eugène Goossens’s Oboe Concerto, with brother Léon as soloist, and the world premiere of Bax’s Symphony No. 7, completed in 1939 and originally dedicated to the conductor Basil Cameron. When the work became an official commission for the New York Fair Music Festival, Bax altered his dedication to ‘The People of America’. The programme on 10 June offered two more world premieres: Bliss’s Piano Concerto, also dedicated ‘to the People of the United States of America’, played by Solomon under Boult, and Vaughan Williams’s Five Variants on Dives and Lazarus.23 The concert opened with Weber’s overture to Der Freischütz and closed with Ravel’s Daphnis et Chloé Suite No. 2. In advance Bliss received a telegram from Lord Lloyd of Dolobran, chairman of the British Council, conveying his ‘best wishes to all for the success of the concerts’. Berkeley class year 1940 – 41 Due to the outbreak of war in Europe, Bliss and his family were unable to return to England in 1939 by way of Canada as originally planned, and under the prevailing circumstances Bliss accepted Elkus’s offer to join him for a term or two at UC Berkeley. Prior to taking up his appointment as a visiting professor in the music department the following year (1940), Bliss travelled to the state of Missouri to give a lecture at the ‘Music Teachers’ National Association Convention’ in Kansas City (held 28-30 December 1939). Given Elkus’s relationship with the Music Teachers’ Association of California, previously cited in Part 2, he probably had a hand in suggesting Bliss attend and give a lecture by way of preparatory work for commencing the class year at Berkeley. Among the delegates present were Arnold Schoenberg from UCLA, American composers Earl V. Moore and Howard Hanson, Dutch pianist Egon Petri and the British philanthropist Robert Mayer.24 Bliss opened his talk titled Modern English Music by saying the word ‘modern’ in the title was not

13 TWO BERKELEY PROFESSORS: ARTHUR BLISS AND ALBERT ELKUS his and had been added by the President of the convention. His address covered Elizabethan and Renaissance composers up to Walton & Britten, with an emphasis on the vocal repertory. He stated ‘I shall put before my students in Berkeley the means of studying how rightly to set the complex English language to music.’25 Bliss was well organised for his university post having accumulated significant lecture material through time spent at Harvard University’s Widener Library in Boston. At this time (December 1939) he was staying in Belmont Town, where Trudy was born and raised. A hand-written memo by Bliss headed ‘Department of Music Berkeley, University California’ sent to Elkus on 17th May 1940 reads: This is just to thank you for showing me the contents of the letter you received from the President’s Office, and to accept the offer with pleasure. After our talk yesterday I feel my usefulness in the department might best be used in the following ways.

In the first semester – 1) a course on Instrumentation or a graduate course on the Symphony 2) a seminar on Composition

In the second semester – 1) a class in orchestral conducting 2) a course on English music

Bliss’s lecture notes have been preserved at the Jean Gray Hargrove Music Library, UC Berkeley and to this author’s knowledge remain to be examined in detail. The notes are extensive amounting to some 650 unnumbered sides stored in two files with cover headings as follows: 1. Instrumentation: class notes for music 108 taught at UC Berkeley during the class year 1940 – 41 2. A Survey of English Music: class notes for music 114 taught at UC Berkeley from Jan 20 – May 17, 1941

14 N. WILLIAM SNEDDEN

A cursory examination of the latter file reveals the text books which Bliss recommended to his students. (Dates below in square brackets are for first edition copies and have been added for information): • A History of Music in England Ernest Walker [1924] • English Madrigal Composers E.H. Fellowes [1921] • William Byrd E.H. Fellowes [1923] • Foundations of English Opera E.J. Dent [1928] • Henry Purcell J.A. Westrup [1937] D. Arundell [1927], Frank Howes26 • The English Ayre Peter Warlock [1926]

Bliss assigned his class weekly assignments which often involved copying out English music from the various periods under review. In a letter to his friend the theatre director and designer William Bridges-Adams, sent from Berkeley 12 May 1940, Bliss revealed: You must imagine me, austere ‘Mr Chips’ sitting on a dias before 100 students to whom I have set a rigorous paper on English music.

For the course on instrumentation, Bliss pointed his scholars to Arthur Edward Heacox’s Project Lessons in Orchestration (1928) and Cecil Forsyth’s Orchestration (1914, rev. 1935), as well as Berlioz’s famous treatise on instrumentation supplemented by Rimsky-Korsakov’s writings on the subject. Bliss specified exactly what kind of parchment paper his students should buy for their exercises and encouraged them to attend rehearsals every two weeks of the UC Symphony Orchestra and UC Concert Band. He also recommended they start a collection of pocket scores, something which Bliss himself practised and maintained during his life.27 And most importantly, he emphasised ‘learn an instrument this term!’ This aimed at those who did not have sufficient practical experience.

15 TWO BERKELEY PROFESSORS: ARTHUR BLISS AND ALBERT ELKUS

In his Missouri lecture Bliss intimated: Entrust me with a symphony orchestra and chorus for six concerts and I shall give you a survey of music of the English school that will have all the exciting adventures of unknown territory.

He both conducted and performed (as a pianist) during his California residency. In a concert commemorating the Seventy-Second Charter Anniversary of the University of California on 31 March 1940, Bliss conducted four dances from his ballet Checkmate with the UC Symphony Orchestra.28 He also conducted the first movement of his Concerto for Piano and Orchestra on 17 November 1940 (see Fig. 2). Marjorie Gear Petray, who taught at UC Berkeley for many years, was the soloist.29 The local Berkeley Daily Gazette of 29 January 1941 cites Bliss as pianist and guest artist at the ‘Composer’s Forum’ meeting on 6 February 1941 held in the San Francisco Museum of Art, Veterans’ Building. In the same newspaper, 4 June 1941, Bliss is reported as giving two performances of his Concerto for Two Pianos and Orchestra together with Margaret Howard at the Hillside Club, 2286 Cedar Street, Berkeley. Bliss bade farewell to life at 2632 Warring Street, Berkeley, sometime toward the end of April 1941 (see Fig. 3.2), a few weeks after the UC Berkeley premiere of his string quartet (8 April) commissioned by Mrs. Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge for the Pro Arte Quartet.30

16 N. WILLIAM SNEDDEN

Figure 2: UC Symphony Orchestra Concert Program – 17 November 1940.

Courtesy of the Jean Gray Hargrove Music Library of the University of California, Berkeley.

17 TWO BERKELEY PROFESSORS: ARTHUR BLISS AND ALBERT ELKUS

Figure 3: Arthur and Trudy Bliss taken at the University of California, Berkeley shortly before Arthur left the Music Department in 1941.

Reproduced by kind permission courtesy of the Syndics of Cambridge University Library (PH-BLISS-F-01941-000-00001.tif Bliss Archive B1941 26a)

Figure 4: Albert Elkus lecturing at the Benner house, Berkeley, Spring 1957.

Photo by Carol Baldwin. In the Albert Israel Elkus Papers, ARCHIVES ELKUS I, Box 14, Folder 25, The Music Library, University of California, Berkeley.

18 N. WILLIAM SNEDDEN

4. Reflections on Berkeley

At your request After receiving a letter of invitation from Kenneth Wright (Director of Overseas Music at the BBC) in April 1941 to help in the music department, Bliss resolved to return to England alone.31 He sailed from Montréal with nine other passengers (6 women, 3 men) boarding the SS Bayano on June 5, 1941, a very old Elders & Fyffes banana boat, part of a large convoy zigzagging its way across the far North Atlantic trying to avoid U-boats for several weeks. Berkeley was far from forgotten, however, for Bliss was soon broadcasting from the BBC to America. On 8 September 1941 Bliss telegrammed Elkus: ‘Please cable me B.B.C. six questions from students’. ‘At Your Request’ was broadcast overseas October 2-3 1941, Bliss answering questions about musical life in wartime Britain put to him by three named students (Schliemann, Ralston, Tullis) forwarded by Elkus on 16 September 1941.32 Bliss wrote back from the BBC on 10 October thanking Elkus for the kindness shown during his visit to Berkeley and for making the broadcast possible, enclosing the transcript. After a year at the BBC, Bliss wrote to Elkus in confidence (17 March 1942) asking if the University would care to have his services again, as he considered it his duty to be with Trudy and the children in America. A cable quickly followed on 28 March asking Elkus to postpone acting on the letter contents until receiving a second letter (this one dated 2 April 1942). Bliss had just been offered, and felt obliged to accept, the Directorship of Music in the BBC: ‘... so alas! Any immediate acceptance of an invitation to return is out of the question. I should still like to return for another course when my duties in England permit.’33 The longing to be with his family and to teach once again in California did not recede until Bliss was finally reunited with his wife and two daughters in London, following two and half years’ separation.

TWO BERKELEY PROFESSORS: ARTHUR BLISS AND ALBERT ELKUS

The Bliss Archive contains a number of postcards from Trudy despatched to Albert and Elizabeth Elkus during the long passage back to England during the autumn of 1943: • We miss Berkeley very much but are enjoying the heading East. We hope to sail this week. (written on red paper, undated, but most probably sent during Sept 1943); • Here we are, well & comfortably waiting our turn to go to London. (a Monsanto postcard headed ‘Just outside Lisbon 29 Sept 1943’);

And, finally, the message most eagerly waited in Berkeley: • The Blisses have arrived in England. (written by daughter Karen with postal address in Arthur’s hand, an undated postcard showing Glastonbury Abbey ruins).

Trudy, Barbara, & Karen arrived by plane in Poole from neutral Portugal (Estoril) on 5 November 1943 and in the evening of that day were met at Waterloo Station by a very happy husband and father.34 Bliss vividly describes the occasion in a letter to Elkus dated Boxing Day 1943: It was a most dramatic meeting one dark night in November at a London station with just enough glimmer to pick out one’s wife and daughters from all the others. For five minutes it did not seem that we had been away at all.

A very real person Looking back on his Berkeley years during the Second World War, Bliss went on to say: I am so grateful for all your kindness, Albert, during this long separation. One of the great compensations was the thought that [Trudy] had such loyal friends as you two near her. Memories of Berkeley are very vivid with me. It was really – war or no war – one of the happiest times in my life, and I always think of working with you as having been a rare privilege. I wish you were my colleague here.

N. WILLIAM SNEDDEN

The friendship between Arthur and Albert and of their two families grew ever closer with the passage of time. Following the war, Albert and his wife made at least two further summer visits together to England around the time Bliss received his knighthood. Bliss’s letter, headed Pen Pits Somerset, sent to Elkus on 4 March 1948, congratulating him for the Elkus Press Edition of ‘Beethoven’s Will & Other Papers’,35 sums up his feelings towards the man and shows how greatly he valued their friendship: You are a very real person in my life and thoughts, and one that I do not wish to lose track of. There are shadowy figures and clear-cut ones amongst one’s friends, & you are decidedly the latter. I can see you vividly, walking in right now, giving one that personal warm hand shake of yours, a chuckle, a piercing look, and we should be [reacquainted] right away.

Sir Arthur wrote to Elizabeth Elkus on 12 February 1962 responding to the distressing news of Albert’s failing health: ‘We are thinking continually of you both’. A week later, Bliss’s great and good friend died in Oakland aged 77. Professor Elkus was a much beloved teacher and mentor who influenced many young musicians. In addition to Bliss, he secured the appointment of a series of men of international renown at Berkeley including: Randall Thompson, Manfred Bukofzer, Ernest Bloch, and Roger Sessions. The Albert Elkus Room in Morrison Hall on the UC Berkeley campus is named in his honour and the Albert I. Elkus Memorial Prize is awarded annually to outstanding students enrolling in ‘Music 27: Introduction to Music’, the famous course that Elkus started at Berkeley ca. 1935 and taught most often. The Department of Music also continues to recognise the support of the Elkus family and Albert’s wife through the Annual Elizabeth Elkus Memorial Noon Concert which began in 1996, two years after her death. Professor Emeritus Albert Elkus (1884-1962) is buried in Mountain View Cemetery, Alameda County, California.

TWO BERKELEY PROFESSORS: ARTHUR BLISS AND ALBERT ELKUS

Acknowledgments I am most grateful to Karen Sellick (née Bliss) for her kind permission to study family letters sent to Albert and Elizabeth Elkus. I also wish to thank Jonathan Elkus for the precious insight he provided into his father’s friendship with Bliss and for correcting some errors in my draft manuscript. My sincere thanks also go to: Stephen Lloyd, the Bliss Trust, John Shepard and staff of the Jean Gray Hargrove Music Library of the University of California, Berkeley, and to Margaret Jones for her invaluable help in retrieving copies of correspondence deposited in the Bliss Archive, Cambridge. Extracts from the private letters of Sir Arthur and Lady Bliss are published by kind permission of The Bliss Trust and are courtesy of the Syndics of Cambridge University Library.

William Snedden received his PhD from Churchill College, Cambridge in 1979. Now retired from a career as a consultant engineer he lives in Edinburgh with his wife, devoting more time to his interests, namely genealogy and musicology. William has recently published articles for the Arthur Bliss Society, including a study of the composer’s American roots. He is currently writing a biography of Leonid Raab (1900-68), one of Hollywood’s most prolific orchestrators of Golden Age film music. [email protected]

References Arnstein, Flora J., Albert I. Elkus, and Stewart W. Young eds. Oscar Weil: Letters and Papers. San Francisco: Book Club of California, 1923. Bliss, Arthur. As I Remember. London: Faber, 1970. Garrett, Charles H. ed. 2The Grove Dictionary of American Music, Second Edition. New York: Oxford University Press, 2013. Mahoney, Patrick. “Sir Arthur Bliss in Santa Barbara.” Noticias 17:1 (Spring 1971): 2-6 Metzger, Alfred ed. Pacific Coast Musical Review 25, 37, 40, 44-47 (1913-14, 1919-20, 1921, 1923- 25), URL https://archive.org/

N. WILLIAM SNEDDEN

Myrick, David F. Montecito and Santa Barbara, Volume I: from Farms to Estates. Pasadena: Pentrex Media Group, 1998. Oja, Carol J. Making Music Modern: New York in the 1920s. New York, Oxford University Press, 2000. Roscow, Gregory ed. Bliss on Music: Selected Writings of Arthur Bliss 1920-1955. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991. Scholes, Percy A. A few Notes upon the work of Arthur Bliss and especially upon his Colour Symphony. London: Goodwin & Tabb, 1922. Seares, M. Urmy ed. California Southland 59-65 (1924-25), 71-72 (1925), URL https://archive.org/

1 Arthur Bliss, As I Remember, (London: Faber and Faber, 1970), 17. In As I Remember, 17, Bliss states his father Francis was born in Springfield, Massachusetts (MA). However, as discussed in Sir Arthur Bliss’s American Ancestry (Snedden), Francis Edward Bliss was born at Brooklyn in the state of New York on 14 March 1847. His US passport applications made at the American Embassy in London, dated 28 March 1901 and 29 May 1906, prove this. Arthur’s grandfather Elijah Bliss Jr. (1816-1899) was from West Springfield, MA. 2 Lorenzo Daniels was related to Mary Beebe Case (1823-1884) from Hartford, Connecticut (CT). Mary was Francis’s mother who married Elijah Bliss Jr. 3 Patrick Mahoney, “Sir Arthur Bliss in Santa Barbara,” Noticias 17:1 (Spring 1971), 2. Patrick was Arthur’s step-brother related through his mother Ethel C. Mahoney who married Francis Bliss in Kensington, 1918. 4 “New Composer’s Society Starts,” The New York Clipper (April 11, 1923), 18. 5 Jerome Hart, “Schism Among the Moderns,” Shadowland, 8:6 (August 1923), 56. The ICG, founded in 1921 by Edgard Varèse and Carlos Salzedo, had given the New York premiere of Madame Noy earlier in 1922 6 “Wanderings by The Man About Town,” Shadowland, 8:5 (July 1923), 65. 7 Percy A. Scholes, A few Notes upon the work of Arthur Bliss and especially upon his Colour Symphony (London: Goodwin & Tabb, 1922). 8 “Weekly Los Angeles Musical Review,” Pacific Coast Musical Review, 44:22 (September 1, 1923), 10. This early ambition of film scoring came to nothing. 9 “Lawrence Strauss’ Song Recital,” Pacific Coast Musical Review, 44:25 (September 22, 1923), 6. A repeat performance took place the following day in the Wheeler Auditorium at UC Berkeley, as stated in “Noted Musicians Will Appear,” Berkeley Daily Gazette, Wednesday Evening (October 3, 1923), 6. During 1920 Albert Elkus orchestrated songs for Lawrence Strauss, e.g. The Pipes of Gordon’s Men composed by William G. Hammond (1874-1945). 10 An autographed concert programme can be found in the Bliss Archive, Cambridge University. The Buckle was also performed the previous day at the Montecito Country Club. 11 French-Canadian mezzo-soprano Eva Gauthier preceded her programme with a talk on Javanese and Malay music and sang in the native costume of Java. Around this time Bliss also accompanied Gauthier in a recital in Montecito at the residence of Cornelius Bliss. Several months earlier she sang Bliss’s Ballads of the Four Seasons at the Aeolian Hall in New York on 1 Nov 1923. 12 Email from Jonathan Elkus to this author, 20 April 2016. 13 Albert Elkus, “Antique and Futuristic Music Pleases London Audiences,” Pacific Coast Musical Review, 40:17 (July 23, 1921) 1. Elkus’s first article sent from London was published one week earlier under the title Summer Music Season in London is Not Normal. At the time there was a coal strike which impacted travel in London. Concert engagements were heavily affected. Elkus opened his first article by observing: ‘England is 23

TWO BERKELEY PROFESSORS: ARTHUR BLISS AND ALBERT ELKUS

beautiful now and even calamities have their have their bright side, for the scarcity of coal has made for the time being a smokeless London with a clear and placid atmosphere.’ 14 Originally composed in 1920, subsequently reworked as the Concerto for Two Pianos and Orchestra in 1923 and further revised between 1925 and ‘29. 15 At the outbreak of World War One the American Consulate demanded Elkus return to America and in October 1914 he published a dissertation “Reflections on Advisability of Music Study Abroad”. 16 Precise biography compiled from two sources: i) Grove Dictionary of American Music, ii) Inventory of the Albert Israel Elkus Papers, 1893-1993, ARCHIVES ELKUS 1, The Jean Gray Hargrove Music Library, UC Berkeley. 17 Impressions from a Greek Tragedy gained immediate recognition following a first performance at the Curran Theatre in San Francisco on 27 February 1920. “Elkus’ Composition Warmly Received by Symphony Audiences” occupied the whole front page of Pacific Coast Music Review, 37:23 (Saturday, March 6, 1920), 1. 18 One of Trudy Bliss’s letters to Elizabeth written before leaving America, dated 3 Aug 1942, discusses arrangements for a number of children in England to come out to California for special care. 19 Monteux introduced Bliss’s Colour Symphony at Carnegie Hall in New York on 5 Jan 1924 with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Elkus corresponded with Monteux from 1939 till ‘49 during Monteux’s tenure with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra (1935-52). 20 The 1938 visit had to be cut short with the Elkus family returning to America on the Queen Mary arriving New York 8 Aug 1938. They would see each other intermittently following World War 2. 21 Bliss must be referring here to coming out to the Pacific Coast for a prolonged period to teach as he was clearly in California well before this date, beginning in 1923. 22 The New York World’s Fair Building the World of Tomorrow celebrated the 150th anniversary of the inauguration of George Washington in New York City. Described as a $155 million wonderland, and the greatest exhibition in history, the Fair ran over two extended periods, namely from 30 Apr till 31 Oct 1939 and from 11 May till 27 Oct 1940. 23 A recording of the premiere of Bliss’s Piano Concerto was issued on APR5627. 24 “Music Teachers to Hold Meeting,” Lawrence Daily Journal-World, Lawrence, Kansas (Thursday, Dec 21, 1939), 1. 25 The full text for Bliss’s lecture “Modern English Music” can be found in Bliss on Music – Selected Writings of Arthur Bliss 1920-1975 ed. Gregory Roscow (OUP 1991), 170-173. 26 Bliss was possibly referring to Howes’ book on William Byrd or Appreciation of Music both published ca. 1928. Howes produced fifteen music books between 1926 and 1969. 27 For example, Bliss was especially proud of the miniature score of Elgar’s Cockaigne overture signed with the words ‘Good luck’ which he received from Sir Edward Elgar whilst serving in France. 28 In the same programme Elkus conducted Britten’s Variations on a theme by Frank Bridge. Two weeks later, on 14 April 1940, Professor Charles C. Cushing conducted the UC Concert Band in the suite from Things to Come transcribed for military band by Sir Dan Godfrey. 29 Petray coached advanced students in the three-piano version of Bliss’s Concerto for Two Pianos, which was played at a student recital. Jonathan Elkus was one of her pupils. Source: email from Jonathan Elkus to this author 4 July 2016. 30 Bliss wrote to Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge on 9 April 1941 remarking ‘I wish you could have been present at the concert last night’. 31 As I Remember, 130 32 The typed script is dated 1 October 1941 and was published as “Music in Wartime” in Bliss on Music, Ibid, 176-180. Two gramophone records were played during the broadcast: Royal Air Force March composed by Walford Davies (3 mins) and an excerpt from the Violin Concerto by John Alden Carpenter (2m 5s). 24

N. WILLIAM SNEDDEN

33 Bliss succeeded Sir Adrian Boult as Director of Music; he held this post until his resignation on 31 March 1944. 34 Air travel from Portugal at this time was not without its risks. When flying from Lisbon to Bristol on 1 June 1943 the actor Leslie Howard and 16 other passengers were killed when the Luftwaffe shot down a scheduled BOAC flight over the Bay of Biscay. It is clear both Bliss and his family showed enormous courage returning separately to Europe during the war. 35 Beethoven’s Will was a direct reprint from 19th century sources. 250 copies were printed in 1947 by the Elkus Press (founded Berkeley 1945). Facing the title page is the invitation issued to Beethoven’s funeral held in Vienna on 29 March 1827. An earlier letter from Bliss to Elkus 29 Dec 1945 acknowledges receipt of ‘a fine example of the Elkus Press’, Bliss exclaiming ‘what a pair of craftsmen you two boys are’, referring here to Albert and his son Jonathan. The booklet in question was either Mr. Roosevelt, whom Bliss greatly admired, and/or Journey to Truckee by Isabella L. Bird.