Battle for Music
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Battle for Music: Music and British Wartime Propaganda 1935-1945 Submitted by John Vincent Morris to the University of Exeter as a thesis for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in English in May 2011 This thesis is available for Library use on the understanding that it is copyright material and that no quotation from the thesis may be published without proper acknowledgement. I certify that all material in this thesis which is not my own work has been identified and that no material has previously been submitted and approved for the award of a degree by this or any other University. Signature: ………………………………………………………….. 1 Abstract The use of classical music as a tool of propaganda in Britain during the War can be seen to have been an effective deployment both of the German masters and of a new spirit of England in the furtherance of British values and its point of view. Several distinctions were made between various forms of propaganda and institutions of government played complementary roles during the War. Propaganda took on various guises, including the need to boost morale on the Home Front in live performances. At the outset of the War, orchestras were under threat, with the experience of the London Philharmonic exemplifying the difficulties involved in maintaining a professional standard of performance. The activities of bodies such as the Council for the Encouragement of Music and the Arts played a role in encouraging music, as did the British Council’s Music Advisory Committee, which co-operated with the BBC and the government, activities including the commissioning of new music. The BBC’s policies towards music broadcasting were arrived at in reaction to public demand rather than from an ideological basis and were developed through the increasing monitoring of German broadcasts and a growing understanding of what was required for both home and overseas transmission. Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony became an important part of the Victory campaign and there was even an attempt at reviving the Handel Cult of the Nineteenth Century. German music was also used in feature film but pre-eminent composers such as William Walton and Ralph Vaughan Williams contributed to the War effort by writing film music too. The outstanding example is Vaughan Williams’ music for Powell and Pressburger’s Ministry of Information sponsored 49th Parallel, in which the relationship between music and politics is made in a reference to Thomas Mann’s The Magic Mountain. Vaughan Williams’ non-film output included the greatest British orchestral work to have come out of the War, his Fifth Symphony; a work that encapsulated all the values that the institutions of public life sought to promote. 2 Contents Abstract ................................................................................................................................................... 2 Contents .................................................................................................................................................. 3 List of Illustrations ................................................................................................................................... 6 Acknowledgements ................................................................................................................................. 7 Introduction ............................................................................................................................................ 8 Chapter One .......................................................................................................................................... 13 Music in the Context of Propaganda ................................................................................................ 13 Music in Britain ............................................................................................................................. 14 Music as Propaganda .................................................................................................................... 16 The Nazi Attitude .......................................................................................................................... 19 The Desire for Music ..................................................................................................................... 21 Distinctions between Cultural and Political Propaganda .............................................................. 24 The Power of Music Propaganda .................................................................................................. 31 Chapter Two .......................................................................................................................................... 35 Morale on the Home Front: Live Classical Performance .................................................................. 35 Myra Hess ..................................................................................................................................... 36 German Music in Live Performance .............................................................................................. 38 The London Philharmonic and Battle for Music............................................................................ 41 Music in London ............................................................................................................................ 50 Vaughan Williams and CEMA ........................................................................................................ 57 Chapter Three ....................................................................................................................................... 60 Reasonable Cadences: Cultural Propaganda and the British Council ............................................... 60 The Council’s Role ......................................................................................................................... 61 Cultural Propaganda in Germany .................................................................................................. 63 The Music Committee ................................................................................................................... 69 Myra Hess’s 1937 Tour.................................................................................................................. 72 The New York World’s Fair ............................................................................................................ 74 Chapter Four ......................................................................................................................................... 81 “Under the Auspices of the British Council” – the Music Committee during the War ..................... 81 Early War Years ............................................................................................................................. 81 The Committee from 1942 ............................................................................................................ 84 3 The Recording Programme ........................................................................................................... 87 Co-operation with the BBC ........................................................................................................... 97 Chapter Five ........................................................................................................................................ 103 Broadcasting, Policy and Music Commissions of the BBC .............................................................. 103 BBC Commissions ........................................................................................................................ 103 The Use of German Music ........................................................................................................... 107 Policy ........................................................................................................................................... 110 Broadcast Monitoring ................................................................................................................. 114 Broadcasting to Europe ............................................................................................................... 118 Beethoven’s Fifth and Victory Celebrations ............................................................................... 123 Chapter Six .......................................................................................................................................... 129 Handel, Beethoven and Humphrey Jennings: the Use of “German” Music in Film ........................ 129 Handel’s Place in the National Consciousness ............................................................................ 129 Culture Heroes in Film ................................................................................................................ 131 Music in the Documentaries of Humphrey Jennings .................................................................. 139 German Music in Feature Film .................................................................................................... 150 Chapter Seven ..................................................................................................................................... 153 A British Magic Mountain: Original Music in Feature Film Propaganda ........................................ 153 William Walton’s Contribution ..................................................................................................