Durham E-Theses 'In the Swim': The life and musical achievements of William Gillies Whittaker 1876-1944 Borthwick, Mary Christine How to cite: Borthwick, Mary Christine (2007) 'In the Swim': The life and musical achievements of William Gillies Whittaker 1876-1944, Durham theses, Durham University. Available at Durham E-Theses Online: http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/2212/ Use policy The full-text may be used and/or reproduced, and given to third parties in any format or medium, without prior permission or charge, for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-prot purposes provided that: • a full bibliographic reference is made to the original source • a link is made to the metadata record in Durham E-Theses • the full-text is not changed in any way The full-text must not be sold in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holders. Please consult the full Durham E-Theses policy for further details. Academic Support Oce, Durham University, University Oce, Old Elvet, Durham DH1 3HP e-mail: [email protected] Tel: +44 0191 334 6107 http://etheses.dur.ac.uk 2 3 'In The Swim': The Life and Musical Achievements of William Gillies Whittaker 1876-1944 MARY CHRISTINE BORTHWICK BA Dunelm., LRAM, LTCL Thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy within the University of Durham The copyright of this thesis rests with the author or the university to which it was submitted. No quotation from it, or information derived from it may be published without the prior written consent of the author or university, and any information derived from it should be acknowledged. Department of Music 2007 1 1 JUN 2008 CHAPTER SIX WGW's Musical Compositions 'There is no possibility of any musical inspiration being an abstract experience' 1 6.1 WGW'S COMPOSITIONAL STYLE FOLK-SONG ARRANGEMENTS, 'NORTH COUNTRIE BALLADS SONGS AND PIPE-TUNES', 'A TRUE REGIONAL MUSIC. WGW's compositional style had been inclined towards modernism since his youth and when it came to die acceptance of his doctoral 'Exercise', his 'modernist' processes such as the use of unprepared dissonances and unconventional1 harmonic progressions provoked disapprobation among his examiners (see Chapter 1). Only when these were removed was he granted pass.2 The late Romanticism of Elgar was a first model for WGW after taking part in choral events such as the Three Choirs Festival at the end of the nineteendi century and die early years of die twentiedi. However, die disintegration of the Germanic hold over music in England and the waning of Romanticism after World War I were especially formative in galvanising die direction his style was to take. WGW's stylistic position was echoed in the experience of Cecil Gray who, as a student under Bantock at the Midland Institute, reported the 'complete anarchy' of his musical education: 'At one moment I would be studying strict counterpoint and harmony with that highly accomplished musician, Dr. W. H. Harris, and at the next I would be encouraged by the genial Principal to pay no attention to such outworn conventions and to write as the spirit moved me.'1 WGW's attitude to harmony in composition was demonstrated by his avoidance of the word 'rule' with his own students and his demonstrating of harmony at die piano by example, correcting students faults by asking 'Does diis sound well?', preceding the prescribed text-book chapter on the subject by keyboard experience. Indeed, WGW's own mediod of composition seems to have been keyboard-based (he later wrote an article on this element of composition with reference to well-known composers), although, significantly. The Coelestial Spheare, one of his most experimental canvases, was certainly composed without access to a piano (see Chapter 1). 1 Whittaker, W G, 'Musical Inspiration', Symposium on the psychology of music and painting, report in The British lounal of Psychology (General Section), Vol. XXXIII, Part I, (July 1942), 42. -Aut V, 8. Cecil Gray, Musical Chairs, 1948, 97. 367 The many influences on WGW's musical style have been elucidated in Chapter 1, including Bainton's arrival in Newcasde, fresh from the RCM, an ardent Wagnerian and already a prolific composer who performed Wolf songs with WGW.4 There are obvious influences here in WGW's song setting. The dyed-in-the-wool Wagnerian, Wolf, a young 'progressive', was, according to Abraham, concerned more with the 'sense' of a poem when setting it dian its 'sound', and 'would bury himself for a time in the work of one poet as Brahms seldom did, producing a near symbiosis'.5 In this way WGW, employing the same integrated style of piano- writing, immersed himself for years with the poetry of W W Gibson, who embodied in his writings the 'Nature Poetry' of die expressionist, writing many Gibson songs, and, to a lesser but similarly intense extent, widi die work of the Australian, John Shaw Neilson. WGW also revered the music of Richard Strauss, hearing him accompany his own songs at a concert in Newcasdef' and discussing Strauss's symphonic poems in a Cambridge University Extension course of 1922. In 1926 WGW also wrote two articles for an Australian recipient on Strauss' Rose'nkavaIter? Trips to London for singing lessons with Frederic Austin kept WGW connected with modern ideas since he studied Mussorgsky Lieder and diat composer's own unconventional approaches to harmony had been so influential on Debussy. While in London he often succumbed to die 'archaic' influence of R R Terry's Tudor revivalist work at Westminster Cathedral, and, after joining the Musical League in 1909, he fell under the spell of Delius's drifting harmonies, 'as empirical and piano-based as Mussorgky's'.8 WGW, as described in Chapter 1, was one of die first in England to lecture on the work of Debussy and Ravel (with Edward Clark), born of his teaching connection with 'Tony' Gueritte. Gueritte, now his teacher in the compositional methods of modern French music, ensured that WGW was completely au faitwidi Debussy's use of consecutive discords and also with his free rhydims, WGW regarding these techniques the means of escape from the German 'bondage' of European music.9 A trip to Paris to hear Pelleas et 4 In 1901 WGW was obviously immersed in a study of Wolfs songs, receiving a gift of WGWs Italian Lyrics from his father in Julv and in December acquiring a volume of Wolf songs 'from a friend' (die first song in the book being 'Der Freund'.) See WGW's Wolf volumes in the Whittaker Collection. GB-Gu. 5 Abraham, G, The Concise Oxford History of Music (Oxford: OUP, 1979), Aut VI, 9. 7 Letter from WGW to Clarrie, 12 June 1926. " Abraham, 805 Aut VI, 8. 368 Melisande was undoubtedly essential for WGW in order to acquaint himself with what was one of the ground-breaking operas of the early twentieth century. There was of course always the influence of Bach, instilled in him bv his teachers Nicholson and Rae. But Bach was also an agency of modernism as seen through the eyes of Busoni, a visitor to Newcasde in 1909 to conduct his own Concerto for Pianoforte, Orchestra and Male Chorus. Busoni's hybridization of forms and media provided a new perspective on Bachian counterpoint, and being 'conscious of a mission to demolish the still lingering conception of Bach as a dry academic composer... he would play Bach fugues with free tempi and long built-up crescendi'."1 Busoni's Bach arrangement of the Prelude & Fugue in D major was played by Percy Grainger in Westgate Assembly Rooms for the Classical Concerts Society on 8 December 1913, some of his Bach Choral Prelude arrangements being performed by Harriet Cohen at a BC concert on 24 February 1923 and his opera Doktor Faust being heard in Frankfurt at the ISCM Festival there in 1927, when the Newcasde BC performed WGWs 13V'1' Psalm. Another new path in composition was shown by Vaughan Williams whose strong nationalist agenda endiusiastically embraced folk-song as a symbol of national character. Moreover, Vaughan Williams's folk-song 'propaganda', which built on die work of Lucy7 Broadwood, Fuller Maidand and Cecil Sharp, rapidly found itself part of a national education policy, and strongly encouraged the arrangement of folk-songs for schools, colleges and home. It was this aspect of Vaughan Williams's work which WGW admired the most rather than the assimilation of folk-song material into a coherent musical language (for which WGW' had less regard notably in the symphonies)" and it was Vaughan Williams's numerous published arrangements, immensely popular during the Edwardian and post-Edwardian years that WGW emulated in his own works. Abraham writes that it was Debussy's influence in France from 1907 and that of the new- folk-song movement which was the practical agent of Bartok's liberation from die German tradition, the latter's set of Bagatelles for piano in 1908 demonstrating 'bitonality, counterpoint of chord-blocks, fourth chords' and the 'non-functional sideslipping of dissonances'. All these elements can be seen to some extent in some of WGW's avant-guard compositions, such as his 1,1 Abraham, 796. 11 Letter from WGW to Clarrie, 12 March 1944. 369 Three Mood Pictures}2 In these piano pieces, however, another influence can be perceived — that of Schoenberg, who, though admiring Brahms and Wagner, sought a 'change of course' to avoid tonality altogether. WGW's connection with Edward Clark (who before the 1914-1918 war had studied widi die composer in Vienna) at the time of their lectures on French music, would indicate that WGW was well aware of the work of the second Viennese School, and certainly of Schoenberg's Drei KJavers/uke, Op 11 (1909) and his Sechs kleine K/amers/iike, Op 18 (1909), although he, like most English composers with the exception later of Elizabeth Luryens (later Edward Clark's wife) avoided the use of twelve-tone technique.