Music Webmaster Len Mullenger

A 114TH GARLAND OF BRITISH LIGHT MUSIC COMPOSERS

Our two TV and film composers this time are: Nicholas Hooper, who has over 160 such scores to his credit, including, for TV, The Land of the Tiger (1998, featuring much mock Indian music), one of many Hooper scores based on the world of nature, and among feature films, The Tichborne Claimant and the "English pastoral" Postcards from the Country; and Julian Stewart Lindsay who did the honours for, inter alia, Great Ormond Street Hospital.

Eric Wayman, born in 1952, was for many years Director of Music at Spalding Grammar School; his principal compositions have been two musicals on Mark Twain: Tom Sawyer (1976) and Huck Finn (1985) which latter includes the haunting song "Mississippi Moon" which evokes astonishingly well the American Deep South atmosphere.

Two ballad composers active early in the 20th Century may be briefly mentioned, each of them well known, as was so often the case, for just one number: E.J.Margetson, for Tommy Lad (another title of his was A Song of Andalusia) and T. Williams for The Larboard Watch

Frederick Scotson Clark (1840-1883), a clergyman as well as a musician, studied at the Royal Academy of Music and in Paris and later in Leipzig and Stuttgart, was a prolific composer for the voice, for piano and harmonium and, especially, for organ (he founded the London Organ School and was Organist at Exeter College). His organ output may be reckoned light, at least that part of it which comprises marches, no fewer than fifteen of them, such as Commemoration March, Inauguration March, Marche Indienne and, especially popular, the March aux Flambeaux.

Tim Knight, Yorkshire-based (he lives in Leeds) and once a chorister at York Minster, has composed a considerable amount of church music, plus songs (like the Songs of the Countryside premiered in Doncaster in 1997), partsongs (examples are A Description of London and Lullaby, both for high voices) and a number of lightish organ pieces (he is an organist) such as Elegy, Fanfare for an Occasion and Scherzetto and the Moorland March (a Yorkshire title!), for a duo of organ and trumpet with which he has been involved. Knight's music is published by the Cheltenham-based Parish Publications, run by Janine and Ian Higginson; Ian's compositions include a number of lightish miniatures: the two Cotswold Collections for organ solo, Sweet Bright Suite, in four movements, for violin and piano, and a number of (choral) carols, notably the intriguingly titled Pianola Play - A Ragtime Carol.

 

Philip L. Scowcroft

Enquiries to Philip at

8 Rowan Mount

DONCASTER

S YORKS DN2 5PJ

Philip's book 'British Light Music Composers' (ISBN 0903413 88 4) is currently out of print.

E-mail enquiries (but NOT orders) can be directed to Rob Barnett at rob.barnett1@btinternet.com

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