MAURICE JACOBSON
(b. London, January
1, 1896;
d. Brighton, February
2, 1976)
by Michael and Julian
Jacobson
see
also Part 2: The Music of Maurice Jacobson
Maurice Jacobson was
regarded in his lifetime as a "musician
extraordinary", gifted with such
exceptional versatility that formal
classifications were quite inadequate
to convey the wide-ranging nature of
his career. Among his manifold activities,
he was a composer, pianist, conductor,
music publisher, editor, broadcaster,
lecturer, and doyen of British music
festival adjudicators. Use of the word
"versatility" sometimes implies
a certain sense of dilettantism; in
Maurice Jacobson’s case, however, he
proved himself a master of every musical
field to which he devoted his boundless
enthusiasm.
Jacobson, who was awarded
the OBE in 1971 for "services to
music", began his professional
career as a solo pianist early in life
- he was, in fact, a child prodigy,
having started serious lessons in both
the violin and the piano at the age
of seven. At 16, he won a piano scholarship
at the Modern School of Music, London,
which enabled him to receive lessons
from Busoni. By that time, he could
play all Beethoven’s sonatas and all
of Bach’s 48 Preludes and Fugues from
memory, a feat which many eminent professional
musicians would envy. In 1916, he gained
an open scholarship at the Royal College
of Music, where, with a four-year break
for military service in World War I,
he studied composition under Stanford
and Holst and conducting under Sir Adrian
Boult, until 1922.
Outside Buckingham Palace (with his
wife, Suzannah), after receiving his
OBE
It was typical of him
that, even in the Army, he formed a
brass band among his fellow-soldiers
- himself playing any of the brass instruments
that lacked a performer.
He matured so quickly
as a musician that, while still a student,
he served as accompanist for two years
to the great tenor John Coates. This
ended only when Coates wanted him to
go to the USA for a recital tour. By
then, Jacobson had just married and
had also begun his lifelong association
with the music publishers J. Curwen
& Sons. (The replacement Coates
chose to tour with him was a 24-year-old
named Gerald Moore, later to become
Britain’s most famed accompanist ...)
Although his main career had moved in
other directions, Jacobson remained
much sought after by leading soloists,
whenever he could find the time.
A truly historic shot. It was taken
aboard the liner "Majestic" in 1931,
when Maurice made his first Canadian
festival tour with a team of "All-Time
Greats" in the adjudicating field (of
whom he was destined to become recognised
as one of the greatest).
From left to right, the team members
are: Sir Hugh Roberton (founder and
conductor of the world-famed Glasgow
"Orpheus".Choir; Harry Plunket Greene,
the great Irish baritone; Harold Samuel,
the pianist and Bach specialist; and
(bearing a striking resemblance to Buster
Keaton), one Maurice Jacobson, then
aged 35
From the start, even
so, there was never any doubt that his
greatest love in the musical field was
composition. One early success came
when he won the Sir Louis Sterling composition
prize, organised by the Jewish Chronicle,
which enabled him to buy the first top-quality
grand piano of his own.
It was a perennial
regret that, because of the growth of
his other activities, he didn’t compose
as much as he wished or felt he should
have done. Nevertheless, a list of his
known works, first prepared for his
centenary in 1996, showed eventually
that his compositions and arrangements,
including collections, reached the respectable
total of some 450. In his last radio
interview, recorded on his 80th birthday
on January 1, 1976, he said that he
still hoped to compose - intimating
that, although a majority of his output
had been vocal works, he thought that
his next composition would probably
be instrumental. This despite the fact
that, because of his failing eyesight,
his doctor had registered him officially
a month earlier as "partially blind"
(A full musical
appraisal of his principal works will
be given in a later article.)
Although from a Jewish
family, Jacobson never regarded himself
as a Jewish composer, per se.
Even so, the influence was occasionally
apparent. In 1932, he took on a part-time
post as Choirmaster at the West London
synagogue in Upper Berkeley Street -
generally accepted as the headquarters
of Reform Judaism in Britain and long
famed for the extra-high quality of
its organ music, in particular. To quote
its obituary notice after his death:
"Very soon his enormous enthusiasm
had brought about a lively choral group
and a splendid choir." Music he
wrote for the choir in this period is
still used regularly in the synagogue
services, notably his harmonising and
arrangement of an ancient Hebrew melody
to the words of Psalm 92. By 1937, he
found that he was away from London too
frequently to continue as Choirmaster,
but he served as chairman of the synagogue’s
music committee from then until the
Second World War and again from 1958
to 1964. He remained a member of the
committee to the end of his life.
It was also during
the mid-1930s that Jacobson was commissioned
by the Markova-Dolin company to compose
the music for a new biblical ballet,
David. With Anton Dolin dancing
the title rôle, it was premiered
in 1936 and subsequently had more than
120 performances. One song from the
ballet music, Psalm 23 set to
Tonus Peregrinus, was later published
separately with the words in both English
and phonetic Hebrew versions.
Another of biblical
origin, regarded as among the most successful
of his individual works for solo voice,
was The Song of Songs (from the
‘Book of Solomon’). The two published
versions, for low or medium voice, with
piano, were derived from the theme threading
through Jacobson’s music, integral to
the scripts, for the six "Men of
God" radio plays broadcast by the
BBC in 1946-47. (Each of the plays was
devoted to a Hebrew Prophet: Elijah,
Amos, Isaiah, Hosea, Jeremiah, and John
the Baptist.)
The BBC Sound Archive
has a broadcast of The Song of Songs
by Kathleen Ferrier on November 3, 1947,
with Frederick Stone at the piano. For
a later broadcast, by Helen Watts, the
composer himself was the accompanist.
He last heard it at an 80th birthday
concert given for him in Brighton, a
month before his death. It was sung
by a young Tees-side contralto, Ann
Lampard, who had immensely impressed
him when he judged her in the Vocal
Solo classes at Ryton Music Festival
in 1973. The words were also read at
the Service of Thanksgiving for Jacobson’s
life, given in London at the "musicians’
church", St Cecilia’s, in March
1976.
Adjudication
To the general public, he was best known
as an adjudicator, having judged at
most of the nearly 300 music festivals
in the UK, as well as making numerous
return visits to festivals in Canada,
Hong Kong and elsewhere. He first rose
to international prominence as the youngest
member of the vintage team which judged
festivals across Canada in 1931, its
other members being Sir Hugh Roberton
of Glasgow Orpheus Choir fame, the great
Irish baritone Harry Plunket Greene,
and Harold Samuel, the pianist and Bach
specialist.
The flavour of these
festivals was caught in an Evening
Standard article by Stephen Williams,
later a well-known BBC music producer,
who interviewed Jacobson in July 1938
after he returned from three months’
adjudicating in Canada with Roberton
and Steuart Wilson. In all, the team
had judged 64,000 competitors. Williams
quoted Jacobson as saying:
"Music there is
considered of paramount importance by
the educational authorities. The bright
schools, in fact, are the music schools.
In a class for junior orchestras at
Vancouver, there were two entries -
one from Kamloops, 250 miles away, the
other from Nelson, 523 miles away.
"The Kamloops
players brought a full symphony orchestra
(except bassoons) of 80 instruments.
The journey cost 700 dollars, which
had been subscribed by their fellow-townsmen.
The Nelson orchestra, strings only,
had given six concerts in the previous
year to raise the 500 dollars for its
transport. These players were between
13 and 17 years of age. I have heard
many worse performances by adult professional
orchestras."
The article added that,
at Montreal, Jacobson judged competitors
of 17 different nationalities. Most
of them were French, and he had to deliver
all his adjudications in French and
English. He instanced as proof of the
freemasonry of music the fact that,
at one festival, Roman Catholic choirs
conducted by priests competed with choirs
of many different denominations in a
Protestant church.
Jacobson’s last visit
to Canada was in 1967, for the country’s
centennial celebrations and again he
gave many of his adjudications in both
languages at many of the festivals.
(He had always loved France, and his
study library included a full shelf
of French literature.)
One immediate outcome
of his early Canadian tours was to cement
what became a lifelong friendship with
the Roberton family, as well as a very
close musical association, particularly
over the publishing of Sir Hugh’s prolific
compositions and arrangements of Scottish
folk-songs, which have since become
part of the regular choral repertoire.
A letter to him from Roberton in March,
1950, concluded:
"What you have
done for Curwen’s, what you have done
for me, for us, for ours; your patience,
your pertinacity, your unchanging loyalty
and affection - all these remain with
us ‘as a perfume doth remain in the
folds where it hath lain’. Of this there
is no possible doubt. So here’s to the
days ahead! May you be given time and
chance to bring to a complete flowering
all that lies deep within you."
Elsewhere overseas,
Jacobson’s successive visits to Hong
Kong from 1959 to 1972 saw the event
more than quadruple in size, to become
the world’s largest music festival,
with some 70,000 competitors. For his
first visit, he was the sole adjudicator.
When his younger son Julian, following
in his footsteps, last judged at the
festival in 2004, he was one of a
sizeable panel of adjudicators
now needed to cope with its continued
growth - there were 24,000 candidates
for the piano classes alone ...
Altogether, Jacobson
worked in the festival field for more
than fifty years, often describing himself
as a "musical missionary".
Appraising his work, Lionel Salter once
wrote: "The first quality about
MJ which springs to mind is his phenomenal
memory - a memory which could be incredibly
specific. On the Thursday or Friday
of a busy festival week, he could turn
and say, ‘Don’t you think that this
girl has the same teacher as that one
we heard on Tuesday?’ This memory, developed
to a remarkable extent, compensated
in many ways for his poor eyesight."
In like vein, Larry
Westland recalled: "I sat by him
at a festival on Teesside, where he
listened to twelve performances of Du
bist die Ruh by Schubert. He made
no notes, and yet adjudicated each intimately,
from memory."
Jacobson’s failing
eyesight put an end to what he himself
described as one of his "parlour
tricks" - his gift, on the festival
platform, of being nearly always able
to pick out individual contestants about
whom he was talking and point to them
in the audience (usually much to each
individual’s gratification, as can be
imagined). Given the often hundreds
a day competing before him, it was no
mean feat. Loss of this trick apart,
however, it was impossible to keep an
old warhorse down. By 1974, when he
was chairman of the judging panel at
"Music for Youth" in the Fairfield
Halls, Croydon, someone was taking his
elbow to help him safely down the sloping
aisles towards the platform, to give
his adjudications. Yet the moment the
platform hove into view, he shook off
the helping hand, bounced up the steps,
and was straight into action. Irrepressible!
Several of the contestants
Jacobson first judged as amateurs at
local festivals were later destined
to become household names. In addition
to Kathleen Ferrier, whom he first encouraged
to become a professional singer after
judging her at the Carlisle music festival
in 1937, when she was 25, his other
"discoveries" included such
leading British artists as Norma Proctor,
Denis Matthews and Dame Ruth Railton,
founder of the National Youth Orchestra.
Jacobson himself was at one time a joint
musical director of the NYO and chairman
of its executive committee for its first
17 years. He was also a guiding light
behind the National Festival of Music
for Youth (which gave rise later to
the Schools Prom, now a three-day annual
event at the Royal Albert Hall).
A lesser-known aspect
of his finds is that sometimes they
were indirect, in the form of advice
to fellow-adjudicators or others, rather
than taken under his own wing. Agnes
Duncan, MBE, a stalwart of the Glasgow
festival (which, incidentally, was the
last at which Jacobson ever adjudicated,
in October 1975), was 97 when she recalled
this incident from long before:
"At the adjudicator’s
table with him once, we had just listened
to a young girl of 17 or 18. She sang
Verborgenheit by Wolf. MJ leaned
over to me and said, ‘Agnes, do you
know this girl?’ I said that I did.
‘Well, keep an eye on her - she is going
to reach the top. See that she goes
to a good teacher’." His advice
was heeded. The girl’s name: Marie McLaughlin!"
[The script of a Radio
3 broadcast on the work of an adjudicator,
given by Jacobson on February 9, 1973,
is at the end of the section on Radio
Talks.]
Kathleen Ferrier
Jacobson was the chief
adjudicator at the Carlisle music festival
in 1937 when Kathleen, then 25,
twice came before him - initially as
a pianist, in the Open Piano Class,
which she won. Then, to his surprise,
she reappeared later as a singer. She
had won the contralto class (judged
by another), which entitled her to go
forward for the festival's supreme Rose
Bowl prize. This time MJ was the adjudicator
again and had no hesitation in placing
her first. When the curtain came down
afterwards (at Carlisle's old Playhouse
Theatre), he had a word with her. She
explained that she had entered the singing
class "just for a lark".... In fact,
it turned out, she had actually done
it for a bet. Some friends had dared
her, and she'd gone in for it just to
win a wager of sixpence! That’s one
story; another is that the bet was from
her then husband and was for one shilling.
Either way, Jacobson recounted that
he said to her: "I don't know anything
about your private life, but your voice
has got a beauty which is quite unique
and, if you contemplated a professional
career, I'm sure there's a place of
any size waiting for you."
It was this initial
encouragement which led her to start
taking serious singing lessons, initially
with a well-known teacher at Newcastle
and then with Roy Henderson.
When she came down
to London after the outbreak of World
War II, it was Jacobson who first taught
her German, for singing purposes, and
accompanied her at her first London
performance. Subsequently, they gave
a great many recitals together to audiences
in factory canteens, air-raid shelters,
bombed churches, even to people sheltering
from the Blitz under railway arches.
This was under the aegis of CEMA (the
Council for the Encouragement of Music
and the Arts), forerunner of the
Arts Council. One of the last times
he played for her was at the Dover Music
Club, where shells from German guns
on the French coast were screaming overhead
as she sang.
Some while later, however,
when he conducted a performance of his
cantata The Lady of Shalott with
the Etruscan Choral Society at Hanley
on May 11, 1944, she sang in the first
half of the same concert. (Among her
songs were Che faro from Gluck’s
Orfeo and Stanford’s The Fairy
Lough.) The tenor soloist for the
cantata was Peter Pears. It was the
first time he and Kathleen had met,
and there can be no doubt that this
led to her first meeting with Benjamin
Britten and her operatic debut in his
The Rape of Lucretia in 1946.
She remained a family friend to the
end of her all-too-short days. (She
died of cancer on October 8, 1953, aged
only 41.)
Curwen’s
Jacobson’s work with
Curwen’s, then one of Britain’s leading
music publishers, began in 1923 as a
part-time reader and editor; he was
appointed a director in 1933 and was
the firm’s chairman from 1950 to 1972,
having played a key part in ensuring
its healthy survival throughout WW2.
His help and musical advice were long
recognised publicly by many people who
were already prominent composers (such
as Ralph Vaughan Williams) or were later
to become so.
In his last radio interview,
he recalled that he met VW while still
at the RCM, studying composition first
with Stanford and then with Gustav Holst.
At one period, Holst fell off a platform
and hurt his head badly, so his classes
were taken over by other composers,
including VW. Since these temporary
teachers often contradicted each other,
the students would have fun by interjecting:
"But Gustav said this ..."
To which VW or some fellow stand-in
would reply: "Yes, but I say
this!"
Despite their age difference
- Vaughan Williams was 24 years older
- they developed a lifelong friendship
and deep mutual respect. Jacobson described
him in these terms: "Absolutely
stable, to a degree. Serene, strong,
and full of fun. He seemed never to
change. Witty and affectionate. His
influence was in his own modesty and
humility."
As an illustration
of these latter qualities, VW would
sometimes call in at Curwen’s when he
was stuck over some problem of scoring.
"He just came along and said: ‘I’m
not very happy about this, Maurice.
What can I do about this?’" And
Jacobson’s suggestions were accepted
without demur.
In fact, their collaboration
dated as far back as 1923, the year
after Jacobson left the Royal College
and started his part-time work at Curwen’s.
The words of VW’s Mass in G minor, published
that year, were in Latin. The firm had
been asked to do a version in English
and, at VW’s suggestion, the task was
confided to Jacobson. The difference
in the number of syllables, between
Latin and English, made it anything
but a simple job - and the young editor
would call on VW every two weeks, to
seek approval for what he had done to
date. A first outcome was that the English
version was eventually published as
being "By Maurice Jacobson, in
collaboration with the composer."
A second outcome occurred
nearly thirty years later, after the
copyright of this version was renewed
in 1951 and it was then among the music
chosen for the Queen’s Coronation service.
The full music for the service was published
by Novello in 1953, with the Creed credited
jointly to R.Vaughan Willams and Maurice
Jacobson. At one stage during the preceding
months, VW visited Curwen’s to discuss
the details and, in passing, asked MJ
what he had received for the work. Nothing,
Jacobson said. He’d regarded it as part
of his job for the firm. It speaks volumes
for VW’s simplicity and generosity that,
there and then, he made Curwen’s check
all his royalties for the English version
of the Mass since 1923 and insisted
that MJ should get half.
Jacobson’s genius as
a music editor was recognised instantly
by virtually everyone who had dealings
with him in that field. Gordon Reynolds,
organist and choirmaster of the Chapel
Royal, Hampton Court Palace, paid this
tribute to him: "I met him after
submitting some song arrangements. It
would have been reasonable to send them
back with the comment ‘These need improving’.
Instead, I was privileged to receive
a lesson in polishing which I have never
forgotten, and that one session was
the happiest and most memorable piece
of teaching I have ever experienced.
Moreover, I was being paid for it! Maurice
Jacobson must have made countless friends
through such acts of kindness."
The Man
Parallel with the fact
that he did indeed have innumerable
friends, from many walks of life, this
last compliment begs the question: Yes,
but what kind of man was he in private
life?
Two features which
would immediately come to mind, for
those who knew him best, were his love
of abstruse word games (habitually played
over meals with family or colleagues)
and also of perpetrating the most ghastly
puns. He was also an avid collector
of variegated "funnies", as
witness this letter in his collection,
dated July 2, 1959:
"Dear Sir, Please
send me down two series of ‘The Treasury
Sight Reader’ by Maurice Jacobson,
and inform me how I must pay, if it
is on delivery or otherwise. By sending
me these music, you would be helping
me keep out of the RUM SHOP - so please
help. Beasley Sirju, Princes
Town High Street, Trinidad, B.W.I.
He also exulted in
a press notice from The Gloucester
Journal, dated September 10, 1910,
which started with enthusiastic coverage
of a Three Choirs performance in the
cathedral of Elgar’s The Dream of
Gerontius, and then related the
prior first performance of a work for
string orchestra by VW, conducted by
the composer. The notice observed, inter
alia: "The impression left in the
mind by the whole composition was one
of unsatisfaction (if we may use such
a word). We had short phrases repeated
with tiresome reiteration, and at no
time did (it) rise beyond the level
of an uninteresting exercise. The band
played the piece as well as it could
be played, and we had some nice contrasts
in light and shade. But there was a
feeling of relief when (it) came to
an end, and we could get on to something
with more colour and warmth. The piece
took nineteen minutes in performance."
And the "(it)"
in this case? VW’s Fantasia on a
Theme by Thomas Tallis!!
Jacobson’s lack of
personal pomposity was abundantly evident
in an incident in March 1963 when, conducting
a choir of 400 children at Lincoln festival,
his trousers sank to his knees and,
while clutching desperately with one
hand, he carried on conducting with
the other but then had to struggle to
the rostrum rail and sit on it, albeit
still conducting the now near-hysterical
children. The cause was not all that
funny, in fact. On the way to King’s
Cross station for his train to Lincoln,
a car cut across the front of his taxi,
forcing the driver to brake sharply;
MJ banged his nose, and the blood flowed
on to his suit and best shirt. Hence
the trouble with the temporary replacements.
MJ not only took it
in very good part - "I’m in good
company, it once happened to Sir Thomas
Beecham" - but was also exasperatedly
amused to show a sheaf of press cuttings
about the incident from all over the
world, even in Japanese. In addition,
ever afterwards, his study displayed
the original of a Daily Mail cartoon
referring to it, by Emmwood.
But perhaps the most
illuminating insight into his character
was afforded through Dr David Clover,
a prominent figure in the field of musical
education in the Sheffield area and
a noted extrovert, known for his jocularity
and bonhomie. Clover, still remembered
affectionately though dead these many
years, was by the adjudicator’s table
when a particularly attractive girl
arrived on the platform to compete.
Ever anxious to share the good things
in life, he drew Jacobson’s attention
to her. MJ had the gift of being able
to listen intently to each entrant while
continuing to write his notes. He paused
and lifted his head. "Very choice",
he commented succinctly - then bent
his head and resumed writing.
There are many points
that could be deduced from those two
pithy words - not least that, although
Maurice had as much an eye for a pretty
girl as the next man and wasn’t going
to rebuff the extrovert by failing to
show appreciation, he would not waste
time on it during festival hours.
Radio Talks
BBC talks about music
formed another prolific aspect of his
"musical missionary" rôle.
The topics ranged from record reviews
to the part played by tone colour in
modern music, from an appreciation of
Ivor Gurney’s songs to a large number
of concert interval
talks (on works by Bach, Beethoven,
Dvořák, Elgar, Vaughan Williams,
Walton and others), from the difference
between classical and romantic music
to a series on English Brass Bands and,
the ultimate accolade, an appearance
on January 29, 1969, as the castaway
in Roy Plomley’s weekly Desert Island
Discs. The eight records he chose
were:
- Bach Magnificat - Munich
Bach Choir and Orchestra
- Ravel Daphnis and Chloë
Suite No. 2 - Philharmonia/Giulini
- Shakespeare/Morley, It was
a Lover and his Lass - John
Coates, Gerald Moore (piano)
- Stravinsky The Rite of Spring
- Paris Conservatoire Orchestra/Monteux
- Holst Neptune, from The
Planets Suite - Members of
London Philharmonic Choir with Philharmonic
Promenade Orchestra/Boult
- On December 25th
- Orpington Junior Singers
- Beethoven Symphony No. 3 in E
flat major, op. 55 - Royal Philharmonic
Orchestra/Beecham
- Stanford The Fairy Lough
- Kathleen Ferrier, Frederick
Stone (piano)
For his luxury, he
requested caviar; and for the extra
books, some paperback detective stories.
Unsurprisingly, he had cogent reasons
for each of his musical choices. But
a whole spread of reminiscences was
encapsulated in his explanation for
having selected The Fairy Lough
as his last choice:
"... just to hear
(again) the sheer beauty of Kathleen’s
voice; to remind me of Stanford, my
first composition teacher. It was one
of his songs, and one of the greatest
songs ever; to remind me of John Coates,
because I must have rehearsed it and
played it for him hundreds of times."
Jacobson was also responsible
for inaugurating the highly popular
BBC programme "Let the People Sing".
His last major radio talk, however,
interspersed with records of his choice,
was on the activity to which he had
devoted fifty years of his life, the
work of an adjudicator. Re-titled impiously
within his immediate family circle as
"The Adjudicator Squeaks",
it was broadcast on Radio 3 on February
9, 1973. Here is the script:
"Sir, you have
insulted my wife!" (The wife on
this occasion was a thick-voice, unmusical
contralto to whom I had just given invaluable
advice.)
[Larry Westland
recalls that the incident occurred at
a North of England music festival and
that the outraged husband tapped MJ
on the shoulder with his umbrella before
protesting.]
"Don’t cry, Jonathan.
I’m sure the adjudicator didn’t mean
to be unkind. I don’t suppose he could
play your little piece any better than
you did." Or, at a more advanced
level, a competitor who played sparkling
Scarlatti as if it were richly romantic
Rachmaninoff, who was heard to remark,
"Oh, I won’t win; that adjudicator
doesn’t like my style."
To say nothing of an
adjudicator - not myself (though it
might have been) - after an unpopular
decision in a big choral class, being
bundled to the back exit of the hall
and smuggled under rugs in a taxi to
the station.
... And I could give
you many more true stories to show that
an adjudicator’s life is by no means
all sweetness and light, and is subject
often enough to unpredictable hazards.
These are not always voiced as in the
examples with which I started this talk.
Even more difficult to come to terms
with are the dissenting unspoken thoughts,
the surly silences instead of the approving
applause, the hostile glares displacing
the grateful smiles.
Now, at the other end
of the scale, listen to this well-beloved
voice - Kathleen Ferrier singing Roger
Quilter’s To Daisies, the song
with which she won the famous Rose Bowl
at the 1937 Carlisle Music Festival.
A few days before this
Rose Bowl victory, I had awarded Kathleen
top place in the open piano competition
at the same festival. She had in fact
played many times in piano competitions
at various festivals, always learning
something from the experiences, and,
I don’t doubt, from her adjudicators.
After Carlisle she continued to compete,
advancing first steadily, and then rapidly
forward along the road that was to lead
her to international fame.
But - and this is the
point - she had entered and competed
for sheer love, with an avid appetite
to learn, in which mistrust of the adjudicator
held no part. And so it is, with very
few exceptions, with the vast number
of competitors at music festivals who
present themselves for public performance
and adjudication year after year.
These festivals are
unique in the world’s music-making.
They provide a performing platform for
all ages from the tenderest upwards
- a testing ground for teachers, pupils,
choirs, conductors - with an interested
audience making up its own mind, and
ready to agree or disagree with the
adjudicator.
What does the adjudicator
do? According to his capacity and the
terms of his engagement, he listens
to class after class of contestants
showing their paces before adjudicator
and audience - singers, choirs, pianists,
string players, woodwind and brass soloists,
guitar, accordion, ensembles of every
sort from a couple of players upwards,
school orchestras, bands, full orchestras
... verse speaking, too. I’d like to
say more about the adjudicator’s duties
in a moment. But it must already be
clear that he is not an examiner, just
as a competitive festival is not an
examination.
Festivals are open
to anybody who will come and play, sing
or hear; whereas Examinations are held
behind closed doors with only the candidate
and the examiners present.
The examiner assesses
- privately; the adjudicator teaches
- publicly. The keen teacher will make
judicious use of both forms of challenge
to him- or herself and pupils.
Now I want you to hear
some children, aged 8 to 11, the Seafield
Preparatory School from Lancashire,
frequent competitors at festivals. Their
gifted trainer attributes the beauty
of their singing largely to advice garnered
from adjudicators. They will sing the
Irish folksong The Sally Gardens,
arranged by Benjamin Britten.
Did you notice that
I used the word "advice",
not "criticism"? I often wish
that the word "criticism"
could be expunged from the music festival
vocabulary. True, a disappointed parent
may say on occasion, "He criticized
my Jennifer severely". Well, if
he did, Jennifer must have deserved
it! But, in fact, most adjudicators
bend over backwards to avoid giving
offence. It is pointless to administer
pills too bitter to be swallowed. Even
more harmful can be apologies to competitor
and audience for bad work, or giving
undeserved praise.
We don’t look for an
exalted standard from every competitor.
We estimate the present standard of
each performance, and - as do all teachers
- give as much advice as the individual
can assimilate and employ at that stage.
The higher the standard, the more searching
the counsel, whether for interpretation
or technique. The better the work, the
more the adjudicator is looked to for
constructive advice.
And so it is that,
over the seventy-odd years of festival
activities in Britain and the Dominions,
the standard of both the performance
and the quality of music has steadily
advanced. There are ups and downs, of
course. But the main advance is clear.
An adjudicator has
to keep abreast of any likely demands
on his faculties. He will need a wide
knowledge of instrumental, choral and
vocal music of all grades, the classics
over several centuries, oratorio, opera,
folksong, lieder, and also contemporary
music right up to hair-raising modernities.
He is likely to meet nowadays as much
Bartók as Beethoven, nearly as
much Shostakovich as Schubert, and more
Prokofiev than Purcell.
A very important ingredient
in advancing musical taste throughout
the years is the quality of the words
sung in all vocal and choral classes
in all age groups. As a sort of musical
missionary, the adjudicator is bound
to serve both music and humanity. Yes,
the human side is basic in his work.
A very nervous competitor,
doing badly, even coming to grief, may
be the most musical person in the class.
I myself have many recollections of
an unmistakable appeal coming from a
competitor, youthful or even adult -
a look which says, "I’m horribly
nervous, please help me ..." I
return the look. Vibrations are set
up, and all goes well.
I don’t dare look away,
and I stop writing for fear of breaking
the contact. It’s a sort of miracle
- a quickly-created trio of three active
forces: Music,. Competitor and Adjudicator.
These festivals are
for amateurs, but inevitably the greater
talents appear, from whom many of our
gifted professionals emerge. At this
year’s "Music for Youth" Festival,
the class for Chamber Music Ensembles
was won by a string quartet from Leeds,
aged 15 to 17.
The
adjudicators were deeply impressed with
the near-professional standards of these
young players. They had chosen some
Haydn and Dvořák, and I think you’d
like to hear them playing. Let’s have
part of the Dumka
from the Dvořák String Quartet
in E flat Op. 51 (The Dolce String Quartet).
The rôle of adjudicator
is a pretty complex one. While assessing
and teaching, he has to engage the interest
of competitors and audience, which may
number from fifty to several thousand.
He has to employ tact, and a spice of
humour in season, always trying to preserve
a festive note within each festival.
He has to give a mark for each performance,
a mark which is really a synthetic percentage
of many factors of interpretation and
technique. He has to write an "adjudication"
for each competitor, words of praise
or advice in due proportion.
All entries are voluntary.
So, too, is the devoted work of countless
‘servers’: executives, hall, platform
and adjudicators’ stewards - to say
nothing of subscribers whose financial
help may just convert financial loss
into a slender profit to be carried
forward to the next festival.
Fostered by the British
Federation of Music Festivals, there
are now some 300 competitive festivals
- also non-competitive festivals mostly
conducted by Education Authorities throughout
the country. The Welsh Eisteddfod has
its own special value and character,
as has the Gaelic Mod held every year
in Scotland. Comparison with the standards
of other countries can be found at the
Llangollen International Eisteddfod,
the Tees-side International, and the
International Choral Festival held in
Cork, Ireland. I mustn’t forget the
wonderful chain of festivals across
Canada; or that stupendous festival
in Hong Kong, with its 55,000 competitors
this year.
Now, for our last musical
example, let’s hear a fully equipped
youthful military band - woodwind, brass,
percussion ... the lot. They are the
Croydon Schools’ Wind Orchestra, and
they are going to play the March
from the "Suite in E flat"
by Gustav Holst.
And on that bright,
optimistic note, this adjudicator is
about to stop talking. He would like
to leave you with the thought that the
adjudicator is a mixture of teacher,
judge, jury, counsel for the prosecution,
and counsel for the defence - all at
the service of music.
Composition
As indicated on Page
1, there was never any doubt that, among
all his manifold musical interests,
his work as a composer was the activity
closest to his heart. A list of all
his known compositions and arrangements
totals about 450 (including collections).
Almost two-thirds of his works were
for the human voice - cantatas, solos
or choral - the remainder ranging over
orchestral, piano solo, two-piano or
piano for four hands, one instrument
and piano, chamber music, and organ.
Here, with a few annotations,
is the list of his more important or
most performed works, prepared for the
Grove website:-
Works by Maurice Jacobson
Cantatas
The Lady of Shalott (Tennyson).
1942.
A Cotswold Romance (concert
version of Vaughan Williams’ opera "Hugh
the Drover"). 1951. A performance
by the LSO and London Philharmonic Choir,
under Richard Hickox, was issued as
a CD by Chandos Records in 1998.
The Hound of Heaven (from Francis
Thompson). 1953. David Willcocks conducted
the first performance of the work with
the Birmingham Symphony Orchestra on
November 16th, 1954).
(Family has composer’s own piano and
vocal scores of each of these, with
some of his performance notes.)
Ballet
David (for Markova-Dolin company,
1936).
Orchestral
David Ballet Suite. Alternative
title: Concert Suite (four movements
from music for the ballet). 1949. First
performed by the Scottish National Orchestra
in 1950. Also a version for piano solo.
Lament for Strings (in memory
of Harry Plunket Greene). 1941. Also
versions for piano solo and for viola
or cello and piano.
Prelude to a Play. 1947. Also
a version for two pianos.
Symphonic Suite for Strings.
First performed by the Hallé
under Sir John Barbirolli at the Cheltenham
Festival in 1951.
Theme and Variations. 1947.
See also a version for piano duet/two
pianos.
Chamber Music
Fantasy (Fantasia) on
Sea Shanties. (For violin, cello
and piano.) 1939.
Suite of Four Pieces. (Trio
for flute or clarinet or viola, cello
and piano). 1945.
String Quartet, G major. Unpubd.?
Incidental Music
For Old Vic productions of Shakespeare’s
"Antony and Cleopatra", "Hamlet",
"Julius Caesar", "Macbeth",
etc. 1929-31. The scores are untraceable
- believed to have been lost when the
theatre was bombed during WW2.
Broadcast Music
The Woman of Samaria (after
Edmond Rostand’s "La Samaritaine").
1945. MS. Unpubd.
Men of God, radio plays on six
biblical prophets, in which the music
was integral to the scripts. 1946-47.
MS. Unpubd.
Good Friday (one-hour radio
play, John Masefield). MS. Unpubd.
(Family has scripts, orchestral music
and piano accompaniment for each of
these, also the old-style records of
all the Men of God music.)
---o0o---
Of nearly three hundred songs that
Jacobson composed or arranged, the following
are those still most frequently performed:
Choral
Ariel (tenor or soprano with
SATB). 1923; Blow the Wind Southerly
(arr. for unaccompanied SATB); Ca’
The Yowes (Robert Burns); The
Creed, as used in the Queen’s Coronation
service. (From Vaughan Williams’ Mass
in G minor, adapted by MJ for Anglican
use.); Ellan Vannin (arr. for
SATB and for unison choir); Follow
Me Down to Carlow (for three different
choral formations). 1938-1961; Italian
Salad (arr. for TTBB); Jerusalem
(arr. from Parry for five different
choral formations); Let Us Now Praise
Famous Men (arr. from VW in two
choral versions); Silent Worship
(Handel, arr. by MJ in two choral
versions); Six Negro Spirituals (arr.
for SATB); Swansea Town (also
for solo voice and piano); Three
Hungarian Folk Songs (Matyas Seiber,
arr. for SAB); With a Voice of Singing
(composed with Martin Shaw, 1957).
Solo Voice
Boys (Winifred Letts). 1922;
Psalm 23 (from "David").
1936; The Song of Songs (Book
of Solomon). 1946; Swansea Town;
Various Shakespearian songs (mostly
the only surviving music from the Old
Vic productions of 1929-31).
Piano Solo
Capriol Suite (arr. from Peter
Warlock’s original orchestral work).
1939; Also a version for two pianos;
Carousal (dedicated to Louis
Kentner*). 1946; David Ballet
Suite (arr. for piano in four movements).
Unpubl. MS, with composer’s own performance
annotations; The Dumb Show (inc.
directions for mime, from incidental
music for "Hamlet"). 1930;
For a Wedding Anniversary 1939;
Lament 1941; Music Room Suite.
Five pieces, first pub. 1935. Two of
them, Rustic Ballet and Sarabande,
are now published separately; Romantic
Theme (1910) with Variations
(1944). 1946; Variations on a
Theme by Schumann 1930. [* Jacobson
befriended the young Louis Kentner when
he arrived in England from Hungary in
the mid-1930s, and he remained a family
friend thereafter. "Carousal",
which MJ wrote for him and dedicated
to him, was among the piano works played
at concerts during his centenary year.]
Piano Duet and Two Pianos
Ballade (composed for John Tobin
and Tilly Connelly). 1949; Capriol
Suite. (1947?); Lady of Brazil.
1954; Mosaic. 1949; Prelude
to a Play (arr. by composer from
his orchestral work). 1939; Theme
and Variations (arr. by composer
from his orchestral work). The MS, still
unpubd., was discovered in the family
archives during preparations for Jacobson’s
centenary in 1996 and had its first
public performance at one of the numerous
concerts of his music that year. The
two pianists who played it have since
taken it into their regular repertoire.
One Instrument and Piano
Autumn Lullaby (cello). MS,
unpubd ; Berceuse (viola).
1946. OUP; Humoreske (viola or
cello). 1948; Lament (viola or
cello); Margaret’s Minuet (violin).
1943; Salcey Lawn (cello or viola).
1948.
Organ
A Blessing ("Go Forth Into
the World in Peace") - various
choral versions, with organ accompaniment,
composed with Martin Shaw; Elegy
for Organ (in memory of E. Norman
Hay). 1943-44. MS, unpubd; Processional
(arr. by Trevor Widdicombe from
"David" ballet music, for
use as wedding march, etc.). MS, unpubd;
The God of Abraham Praise (Leoni),
arr. for SATB choir with organ accompaniment.
Agreement in 1964 with C.U.P. arranged
for its inclusion in the Cambridge Hymnal.
Principal publishers:
J. Curwen & Sons (Music Sales Ltd);
Elkin; Lengnick; Novello; Augener; Cramer;
Roberton Publications, a part of Goodmusic
Publishing
Jacobson’s cantata
The Lady of Shalott received
unanimous acclaim from eminent critics
of the day. Edmund Rubbra, in Monthly
Musical Record, classed it as "one
of the most poetic and imaginative works
that I have heard for some time".
Dr Thomas Dunhill and Eric Blom both
expressed pleasure that Jacobson was
the first prominent composer to tackle
Tennyson’s poem successfully. Dunhill
said the work "is noteworthy for
vivid imaginative qualities" and
for "music charged with quite touching
expressiveness", and described
the choral writing as "masterly".
Blom, after a performance in Birmingham,
spoke of Jacobson’s musical idiom as
"extraordinarily evocative, sometimes
quite magically so, and exquisite in
its use of subtle colour of harmony
and of sound-values".
But his greatest composition,
in his own and most other musicians’
view, was his large-scale setting of
Francis Thompson’s mystic poem The
Hound of Heaven - spiritually universal
in theme. First performed in 1954 by
the City of Birmingham Orchestra and
Choir, conducted by David Willcocks,
it also received unanimous critical
acclaim... "A work of outstanding
originality and true spiritual perception"
(Alec Robertson, The Listener).
"A powerful and exciting score,
intensely dramatic, with masterly word-painting"
(Stephen Williams, New York Times).
"I hope this remarkable work will
be widely taken up" (W.R. Anderson,
The Music Teacher)
Subsequent performances
included a nationwide Easter Sunday
broadcast in the United States. After
a performance in New Zealand, the critic
of the Christchurch Press commented:
"It is to be hoped that it will
not have to wait for the genius of its
writing to be recognised in Europe before
it gains proper recognition in England
as a major work." So far, despite
the initial praise, this hope has not
been fully realised. Some twenty years
were to pass before the BBC chose the
cantata for a broadcast honouring Jacobson’s
80th birthday. It was transmitted on
January 2, 1976 - exactly a month before
his death. © Michael and Julian
Jacobson, November 2005
The
Music of Maurice Jacobson
---o0o---
This article has been
jointly written by Michael and Julian
Jacobson - respectively, Maurice's
son by his wife Suzannah, a professional
singer, and his younger son by the composer
and pianist Margaret Lyell
A CD of Jacobson’s
music as performed at the Cadouin Festival
is available through Michael Jacobson
at: B.P.1, 24250 La Roque-Gageac (France).
Cost: £7.99 (incl. p&p) per CD.
The price would come well down for bulk
orders. Michael D. Jacobson jacobson@wanadoo.fr
Tel. (0033) 05 53 29 52 27 Fax: ditto
15 28
The CD couldn't include the whole concert
because it had to be kept within the
then maximum length of 74'. Michael
and Julian chose the four more important
items; they are in a slightly different
running order from that at the concert.
Details as follows: 1. Suite of
Four Pieces. Trio for piano,
cello and clarinet. (Respectively, Julian
Jacobson, Lionel Morand and Richard
Blewett.) [12'19"]; Published by Augener
in 1946. Copies held by British Library,
BMIC, Royal College of Music, and possibly
BBC. Background: The Suite, also scored
for flute or viola instead of clarinet,
was submitted by MJ in his early years
in a competition for a new composition
for wind and strings. The judges split
the first prize. One of the two winners
was Arthur Bliss with "Conversations"
(today a well-known work). This Suite
was the other winner. Besides this recording
at the Cadouin concert, another performance
available from Michael Jacobson is on
an audio-cassette taped at an 80th birthday
concert for MJ at Brighton in January
1976 (a month before he died) and subsequently
broadcast by BBC Radio Brighton. It
was played by the Capricorn Trio, likewise
for clarinet, cello and piano (the latter,
again, being Julian Jacobson). 2.
Carousal. Piano solo (Julian
Jacobson.) [5'51"]. Published by Lengnick,
1946. Copies held by British Library,
BMIC and BBC. Background: This work
was composed for and dedicated to Louis
Kentner, who was befriended by the Jacobson
family after he arrived in England from
Hungary - about 1935 - and who remained
a close family friend from then on.
MJ was the first President of the Chopin
Society in London, founded in 1971.
After his death in 1976, Kentner was
the next President. Besides the cassette
of a performance (also by Julian Jacobson)
at the 1976 Brighton concert, Michael
Jacobson has a recording of the work
being played by the composer himself.
3. Theme and Variations for
piano duet. (Christopher Black and
Yoko Katayama.) [20'17"] Background:
At the Cadouin concert where it was
premiered, it received a standing ovation.
4. The Lady of Shalott.
The Aire Valley Singers and the local
Cantilène choir, conducted by
David Bryant. Tenor soloist: Leon Cronin.
Piano acc.: Julian Jacobson. [32'10"]
Published by Curwen in 1942. Now with
Music Sales Ltd., who have scores and
parts for hire.Copies held by British
Library and BBC. Background: details
also in the notes just sent to you and
in the full biographical article.
Playing with his granddaughter,
Sallyann (then about 4). This would
have been in the garden of Maurice's
former London home in St John's Wood
(just behind Lord's).
