A 193rd GARLAND OF BRITISH LIGHT MUSIC COMPOSERS
Norman Fulton (1909-80) worked for the BBC in
various capacities. Trained at the Royal Academy of Music (he was appointed
Professor of Harmony there in 1966), his output was mainly classical,
including two symphonies, but he earns inclusion here for his incidental
music for radio features (including a production of Shakespeare’s A
Winter’s Tale), Dance Miniatures (four sets) for piano duet,
a Serenade for strings and, from 1961, the Waltz Rhapsody
for piano and orchestra.
William Fenney (1891-1957), born in Birmingham
and a pupil of Granville Bantock, composed, besides some chamber music,
several, shortish, lightish, pictorial orchestral pieces (Dawn, In
Shadow, In the Woods, for strings, and Pastoral), also songs
which are ballad-like in character: The Bugles of Dreamland, Gold
Wings and The Sands o’Dee.
Finally for some shorter mentions. Arthur Grimshaw,
active between the wars, composed ballads, the best known of these being
The Songs My Mother Sang. From about the same period, Claude
Fenn-Leyland is worth a mention for his orchestral suite The
Palace of Puck, whose three movements were entitled Tarantella,
Idyll and Masquerade. Roy Green flourished in the
1950s, as an arranger (notably of medleys for "Friday Night is
Music Night") rather than a composer. From the same era or a little
afterwards, Brian Douglas had his Music For Strings published
by Mozart Edition and Denys Darlow (1921-), conductor and arranger,
had his Redowa Polka used in A Musical Banquet at Her
Majesty’s Theatre.
Philip L Scowcroft
May 2001
Philip's book 'British Light Music Composers' (ISBN 0903413 88 4) is
currently out of print.
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