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VICTOR HELY -HUTCHINSON
1901-1947
A MANY-SIDED COMPOSER
by John Hely-Hutchinson
Victor Hely-Hutchinson was born nearly a century ago. During his short life,
he developed from a child prodigy into one of the most versatile musicians
of any era. Between the mid 1920s and the mid-1940s he was widely known as
a solo pianist, accompanist, orchestrator, academic, reviewer, administrator,
conductor and composer, and he achieved these successes during a period when
an immense number of professional musicians were active. According to his
friends, of whom he had many, his sunny, loyal nature and rock-hard principles
of conduct shone like a bright light on a generation shocked, on the one
hand, by social disasters in the form of two world wars and the great depression,
but inspired, on the other, by individuals such as Einstein, Fleming, Stravinsky,
Pavlova, Picasso and Walt Disney.
Victor was the youngest son of Sir Walter Hely-Hutchinson, the last Governor
of Cape Colony, in South Africa. At the time of his birth, the Boer War was
in its closing stages, and Britain had finally realised that it was not in
her interest either to crush entirely the spirit of the Boer Republics, or
to alienate their close relatives in the Cape. Sir Walter identified closely
with an emerging South Africa, and developed a polite and understanding rapport
with local population groups. When a serious outbreak of plague threw Cape
Town into a panic, Sir Walter and his aides put on their best uniforms and
walked in slow time through the fever wards.
Lady Hely-Hutchinson played the piano nicely and could sing a large repertoire
of songs prettily to her own accompaniments. Her daughter, Natalie, who was
a few years older than Victor, played the violin. So the family background
was well suited to raising a musician, and they could exert the social and
financial influence needed to obtain the best training. The Governor’s
children were educated in England. So, soon after Victor’s birth, in
1901, his mother took him to a house in Kent, to be near her other sons.
Victor became a strong, stocky baby, and soon developed a violent temper.
His mother found that the only way to quieten him was to play the piano.
He sat on her knee, and before he could even speak, could sing the notes
she sang immediately after her. He quickly learned the names of the notes
and, in the early summer of 1904, aged two, was heard to say thoughtfully
"Cuckoo, E and C". Perfect pitch was beyond the comprehension of the family,
who decided to hire a professional teacher, Charles Hoby, Director of Music
of the Royal Marines at Chatham. Hoby quickly came to the conclusion that
Victor had a remarkable general intelligence. At 3-years old his temper had
disappeared, and he was playing "the Merry Peasant" with authority, with
his feet on a box over the pedals.
Victor returned to South Africa at the age of five, for the last two years
of Sir Walter’s term as Governor. He could soon simplify orchestral
works for the piano, and transpose at sight into any key. After the Governor
heard him, any extra time he and his lady could spare from their official
duties was spent on helping him develop his talents, even to the extent of
studying musical theory. They were however, particularly careful to prevent
listeners from giving Victor a swollen head by showing undue surprise at
his performances. Victor’s musical education was taken over by Dr Barrow
Dowling, the organist of Cape Town Cathedral, and father of a large family.
The first serious shock in Victor’s life was the death of Dowling’s
youngest daughter, and he sublimated the pain by writing possibly his first
serious composition.
One of the Governor’s closest friends was Sir Abe Bailey, and the two
men possessed two of the first automobiles in the Cape. When Sir Walter fell
desperately ill, the family was taken to stay at Muizenberg, but it soon
became obvious that he would recover only if Victor played the piano to him.
After his recovery, Sir Walter was so proud of the compositions which Victor
had completed by the age of eight that he had a book of them published.
During 1909, Sir Walter monitored the new constitution of the Union of South
Africa, in which, for the first time, the former Boer republics were unified
with the former British colonies. Soon after agreement was reached, he retired
back to England, in order mainly to supervise Victor’s formal education.
Shortly after their arrival, Victor was taken to visit Sir Hubert Parry,
who, after hearing Victor’s interpretation of Beethoven, recommended
that he study under Donald Tovey. A school (Heatherdown) was chosen near
Tovey’s home, and thus began a ten-year association leading to a life-long
friendship. Tovey insisted that, even at the age of ten, Victor should obtain
a thorough grasp of counterpoint before moving further into composition.
He also introduced Victor to the frivolous side of life, by setting
advertisements to music. Meanwhile Victor acted as organist at the local
church.
Victor with Sir Walter Parratt and Donald Tovey
1912
Heatherdown made full use of his talents as a musician, and by now his
compositions had become quite sensitive. Two songs: "A Birthday" and "Dreams"
to words by Christina Rosetti, were particularly admired. His hands were
too small to cope with octaves, but he developed a technique of jumping from
top to bottom of a chord so rapidly that the notes sounded simultaneous.
When playing the organ, he could not reach the pedals, so he used to leave
the seat and run along them. It was also discovered that he could learn and
understand his schoolwork much quicker than his contemporaries. He had massive
powers of concentration, and could work while his schoolfellows were larking
around him. He could, by this time, improvise in the style of many different
composers, and his setting of "Old Mother Hubbard" in the style of Handel
dates from this period. One afternoon he was asked by the headmaster to play
some music to illustrate the personality of a schoolmate. This he did with
astonishing skill, and then went on to play pieces which illustrated the
personalities of other boys. So accurately did he portray them that all were
correctly guessed by the staff.
Victor was entered, in 1914, for a scholarship at Eton, at the age of twelve.
He was placed half way up the list of successful candidates, in competition
with many boys a year older than himself. Around this time, it was felt by
some of the staff at Heatherdown that he was straining himself, for in addition
to his schoolwork, he had written, firstly, a symphony, and secondly a mass
in memory of his father, whose recent death had made a deep impression on
him. To cap it all, Tovey had arranged a concert in the school hall at which
Victor played the solo part in a Mozart Concerto, accompanied by the London
Symphony Orchestra.
Boys who had won scholarships to Eton were housed in a separate building,
known as College. Even in such rarified company, he seems to have been regarded
as out of the ordinary. He remained very approachable, and later his juniors
in College were never frightened of him. He made friends easily, yet his
contemporaries seemed to feel that they could not know him intimately, since
he seemed to understand them better than they understood him. He entered
with zest into all activities, including sport. He was a good scholar, even
by comparison with his fellows in College, and ended up about fifth in the
school. He developed into an amusing debater and held decided views on many
subjects, arguing his case pertinaciously, uncompromisingly, always with
wit and clarity, never bitter, disgruntled or intolerant. He knew how to
say seemingly outrageous things without causing offence, and his candour
was disarming because it was never tinged with malice. The Precentor of Eton,
Dr Basil Johnson, was always grateful to Victor for his unfailing support
during some difficult years, for he never mastered the art of controlling
masses of boys. He was however less grateful to Victor for teaching his parrot
how to swear.
As a musician, Victor progressed methodically. His first task as an organist
was to gain independence between hands and feet, after which he was able
to play the most advanced organ works. He also had the advantage of lessons
in composition from Sir Charles Stanford in Windsor. These lessons, after
the thorough grounding in basic counterpoint by Tovey, would have crowned
his facility in theory. His recitals at school concerts included works by
Bach, Parry, Schumann, Moskowski, Mozart, Chopin, Rheinberger, Brahms and
himself. He was ubiquitous as a musician, playing the harmonium for college
prayers, coaxing the old instrument into a new lease of life; accompanying
the headmaster’s daughter’s ‘cello; and playing, quite
exquisitely, Mendelsohn’s incidental music to a college production of
"Midsummer Night’s Dream". He was at his most remarkable accompanying
community sing-songs, in which he exploited his skill at improvisation. The
accompaniments followed every nuance of the words, and, in the comic songs,
they provided an illustrated running commentary, based on every device of
piano technique, the whole thing being illuminated by his superb sense of
fun.
Victor’s brother, Christopher, fought through the first world war, and
Victor regularly attended intercession services. His feelings about the war
were later expressed in three serious compositions: "The unknown warrior",
"The song of the soldiers" and "I vow to thee my country". During his final
year, in 1919, he was prepared for the Nettleship Scholarship at Balliol,
which he was awarded. The aim of the Scholarship is to enable budding musicians
to broaden the scope of their interests, and Victor elected to study modern
history, indicating perhaps that he wanted to try to build on his studies
of ancient history at Eton, in order to understand the causes of what to
many appeared to be a totally senseless war.
It was typical of his respect for others that he initially applied for private
rooms at Oxford on the grounds that his playing might disturb any companions.
Such, however, was his friendly nature that one of his friends prevailed
upon him to share lodgings. He entered into all college activities, such
as tennis and swimming, with the same concentration he showed when tackling
any subject, and he was soon recognised as one of the leading undergraduate
pianists.
Although his lodgings were on the busy Cornmarket Street, nothing could destroy
Victor’s concentration, especially when he was composing. He joined
the Nonsense Club, at which members were expected to read papers on any subject
which made no sense. In social life, he was quiet, and not in the least
self-assertive, and he never thrust his musical knowledge into any inappropriate
group. Such was his general knowledge that he could hold his own on most
subjects.
The end of his stay at Oxford came unexpectedly, in 1921, after only a year,
in response to an invitation to teach at the South African College of Music
in Cape Town, who were short of staff with theoretical knowledge. So Victor
returned to his roots, very near to his birthplace. At the College, he enjoyed
discussing music in general with Professor Bell and Leslie Heward. Heward’s
tastes were general, Bell’s experimental, while Victor clung to the
classical values. Bell felt that the greatest strokes of genius happened
by accident, such as chance extraneous sounds or mistakes in playing, while
Victor argued that experiments must be constrained within well-established
structures. "You cannot tie balance and inspiration down to a set of rules"
said Bell. "Yet the greatest art, whether in music, sculpture or painting
is always imagination at its highest held within form at its simplest", replied
Victor, a phrase which could be said to epitomise much of the music he wrote
thereafter. When the three friends turned to performing, Bell would play
and sing the parts (one after another) of some opera he had just written,
Heward would render on the piano a complicated modern orchestral composition
he had just received in the post, while Victor would produce extemporary
variations on a theme by, say, Haydn or Mozart with an invention and wit
that were cool and entrancing.
At this stage, Victor began to crystallise his ideas on citizenship, denying
that the musician and citizen could ever be separated. His/her duties in
the home and to the community must always be balanced, not overshadowed,
by the demands of his/her art. He was meticulous in keeping accounts. Bell
was worried about Victor’s prospects as a teacher, as most of his students
were young, frivolous women. However, Victor tackled the task with his usual
thoroughness and dedication, and his immense knowledge meant that he could
not be floored by the trickiest questions. In line with his feeling that
musicians should serve their communities, he and Bell arranged most of the
college music for female voices , these being in the majority. At this time
Victor’s compositions were fairly modernistic, a good deal more so than
in later years. Holst and Vaughan Williams seemed to be his inspirations,
and he was less happy with nineteenth century music. Dr Bell tried to foster
his interest in modern developments, and felt that Victor would eventually
develop a strong personal style. At around this time appeared his setting
of "The Owl and the Pussy Cat" and some of Harry Graham’s "Ruthless
Rhymes", also his "Three Fugal Fancies". Victor’s friendships with other
musicians never influenced his judgement of their compositions, and he could
be a severe critic where this was justified.
Simultaneously, his brother Christopher was working on the mines in Johannesburg,
and, possibly it was during a visit to his brother that Victor met Hugh Tracey,
the musicologist who researched African music. When he was taken to see an
African mine dance, and invited to play the instruments, he extemporised
some effective music on them, much to the surprise of the dancers, bearing
in mind that the instruments were not tuned to the chromatic scale.
At this time, he met and married his life’s companion, Marjorie Hugo,
who has been described as one of the two most beautiful contemporary women
at the Cape. Marjorie played the violin, was a talented artist and a dedicated
ecologist long before the subject became fashionable. She was given to strong
enthusiasms, and never wavered from her reverence for Victor, either during
their 21 year marriage or her 41 year widowhood. During this period, he was
introduced to broadcasting, and was known "Uncle Porps" on Children’s
Hour, possibly because of some strange instrument he had invented. As a veteran
broadcaster at the age of 24, he wrote a humorous article about radio from
the performer’s point of view, saying "To begin with, I went down to
the studio in the same sort of spirit as a child swallowing gunpowder, to
see what would happen". These experiences made him aware of the broadcasting
opportunities opening up in Europe, whither he returned in 1926.
The first Christmas card from the SABC Children's
Hour 1924
His first job in the BBC at Savoy Hill was styled officially as musical
assistant, and the young organisation was so fluid that he found himself
doing all sorts of musical jobs, such as programme building, reviewing,
accompanying, conducting and arranging, as well as non-musical jobs such
as using his general education to edit and write letters on behalf of other
members of staff. He also contributed to Children’s hour as "Uncle Bunny".
Outside the BBC, he continued to conduct and play in public, and also composed
prolifically, including incidental music for many plays, some of which is
missing, because, possibly, it was improvised. In 1927 he produced his
"Variation, Intermezzo, Scherzo and Finale", for whichhe was awarded the
Carnegie prize. In the same year appeared the "Carol Symphony", which led
to correspondence with Mary Levett, who, from that time until his death,
collected press announcements dealing with his platform and broadcast
performances. According to this collection, between October 1930 and August
1933, he played, on average, once every eleven days and conducted once per
week. His arrangements were performed four times per year, his stand-alone
compositions once every three weeks and his incidental music three times
a year. Over the same period, he attracted 7 biographical notes and 25 reviews,
and possibly contributed as many as 73 programme notes and lectures.
Victor and Marjorie set up house in Hampstead, and it was during this period
that his two sons were born. He cycled to and from work, tying scores,
conductor’s batons and other items onto the frame with string, and
conducting imaginary orchestras through the traffic in central London. After
cycling through the rain, he would hang his shoes and socks over the radiator
in his office and dictate memos in his bare feet. When the BBC moved to
Broadcasting House, the music department was housed in offices on the fifth
floor, with a fairly broad ledge running under the windows the full length
of the building. For a bet, Victor hoisted his bicycle outside his window
and rode it up and down the ledge. Shortly afterwards he received a memo
stating: "There is no room for bicycles in Broadcasting House".
He was continually in and out of other people’s offices, relaying, in
his rather nasal voice, the latest musical joke, such as Sir Henry Wood’s
habit of conducting rehearsals in his broad cockney accent:
"Na
then Vi’lins, wot you a doing of, sawin’ away regardless?".
Une belle histoire (BBC
copyright)
In 1933, he felt that BBC music needed co-ordinating and suggested that he
himself be appointed manager. The BBC acceded to his request, but made him
manager of its Birmingham office, a move that developed into a fruitful 13-year
association with the city. In Birmingham his new secretary, Joan Forsyth,
confirmed his powers of concentration in the midst of noise, his unflappability,
the painstaking care with which he treated any contact, and his rapid transition
from a scholarly demeanour to almost schoolboy mischievousness. For instance,
after dictating a particularly difficult memo on some high policy matter,
he would look at her and say "Selah", and with a twinkle "May I go home now?".
His main achievement was the founding of the BBC Midland orchestra. In 1934,
he was approached to take over the Chair of Music at Birmingham University,
in succession to Sir Granville Bantock. As a teacher, he did not drive the
students, and tended to let them make their own mistakes, possibly to see
if these "mistakes" were in fact new inventions; but any student who approached
him could tap an inexhaustible well of knowledge. He seemed to have an instant
grasp of each student’s difficulties from the inside. In spite of his
encyclopaedic knowledge of classical composers, he peppered his lectures
with illustrations from the 20th century, taking care to avoid his own
compositions. He made little effort to classify composers into say "baroque",
"classical" or "romantic", preferring to analyse their works according to
the harmonies, counterpoint and scoring they employed. His composition students
felt that their work always remained their own, even after Victor had made
helpful, and in some cases radical suggestions. His teaching was intensely
practical.
One of his main dicta regarding conducting was: "remember, all orchestral
players are frustrated soloists", and in writing out parts: "legislate for
idiots". He was always available to accompany sing-songs in the Students’
Union, and seemed to be universally popular. On the rare occasions when he
spoke in the senate or the faculty, his grasp of essentials and brevity made
a deep impression. There was a strong movement to make him Dean of Arts,
a movement which he diverted when it became clear that he might soon be offered
the Directorship of Music at the BBC. Outside the university, he was elected
President of the Birmingham Brass Bands association, was associated with
the Bach Choir, often conducted the City Orchestra, and was chosen to dedicate
the Elgar window in Worcester Cathedral. In addition to numerous concert
programme notes, he wrote music for a number of plays for radio, and for
the new television service, which had started in 1936. He once visited the
studios at "Ally Pally" before a circus programme, and was surprised, when
using the toilet, at being watched from the bath by a sealion. He wrote several
short orchestral interludes for variety programmes, at least one well-received
longer work entitled "Serenade", and background music for films. Such were
the financial constraints laid on film music that only eighteen musicians
could normally be employed, and this meant only eight strings. Victor found
that the general tone of the ensemble could be improved by including an
unobtrusive piano, and he thus could be said to have re-introduced a form
of continuo after 200 years.
He was perhaps at his most relaxed at home, preferring intimate company,
where he could discuss any matters of musical, or of local interest. He was
not perhaps greatly moved by national issues, since musicians were less affected
than many professions by the great depression, for, in addition to music
for traditional concerts and recitals, a lot was required by the growing
radio, television and film industries, and the deficiencies of recordings
meant that much of it had to be played live. Although he was also possibly
rather incurious about international events, he was under no delusions about
the horrors of war, and foresaw accurately what was likely to happen to
civilians. After Munich, he moved his family out of Birmingham to a rural
village, where his first job every evening was to pump water from the well
up to the cistern. In summer, he would then happily walk a mile over the
fields and along the canal to the local, where he was known as "The
gen’lman as loiks ‘is point". As a Father, he took care to smooth
the paths of his sons through school, and also in the neighbourhoods where
they lived.
Victor with his family
1939
On the outbreak of war, he immediately enrolled as an ARP warden in Birmingham,
and spent many nights at the post. During one particularly intense air-raid,
the wardens heard the terrifying noise of a falling bomb equipped with sirens.
"Ah" said Victor, "That’s exactly the sound I need in my next intermezzo".
In response to an appeal, he also applied to join the University Cadet Force.
In spite of the misgivings of the commandant at appointing a professor of
music to help organise the force, Victor very soon proved his worth, putting
his vast concentration into a study of military tactics, weaponry and
organisation, eventually rising to command a company.
Although he himself was maintained in his University post because of his
age and seniority, musicians were often starved of funds. To raise funds
for the City of Birmingham Orchestra, Victor gave a series of recitals of
all Beethoven’s Sonatas, which he knew off by heart. It was said that
he also knew by heart all of Bach’s 48. As usual, he entertained his
fellow cadets along with other troops and civilians, often playing on appalling
pianos after driving long distances through the blacked out countryside.
When the conductor of the City Orchestra died, he offered to take over the
conducting and artistic direction. Amid these activities, he felt that his
lack of formal qualifications might make progress difficult later on, so
he studied for a Doctorate at Oxford, which was conferred on him in 1941.
Soon after, he repeated his recitals of the Beethoven Sonatas at Oxford,
in support of a memorial to Sir Donald Tovey.
When the call came, in 1944, for him to take over the Directorship of music
in the BBC, Victor, in spite of having served his apprenticeship, was, at
42, still young. The job was regarded as the most exacting musical post in
Britain, for broadcast music played a massive role in the life of the country.
Realising that the administrative duties would soon prevent him from practising
the piano, the BBC, which at that time ran the Proms, invited him to play
Beethoven’s fourth concerto in the Albert Hall, after which he was recalled
to the platform five times. Eight editorials were written about his contribution
to music in Birmingham, and his presentation book was signed by 344 individuals
and institutions. At the invitation of his successor at BBC midland, Hubert
Foster Clark, he took his family on an extended holiday to the lake district,
where he demonstrated his physical fitness by scaling Great Gable.
With typical conscientiousness, before his contract with the University expired,
he spent many weekends at the BBC in London, learning the minutiae of the
job. His first action on taking up his post was to send each of his assistants
on leave in turn and take over their jobs. There was no musical specialisation
which he could not fulfil. The Director General found him a resourceful
administrator, but his predecessor, Sir Adrian Boult, found fault with him
for always leaving his office door open, and remaining accessible to all
comers. He was delighted that Joan Forsyth was willing to become his secretary
again. Victor bought a house in St John’s Wood, within walking distance
of his offices in St Marylebone High Street, and, in spite his £2000
p.a. salary, gave up his car. Once again, he regaled his colleagues with
the latest stories, including one of the most poignant, about a broadcaster
to an occupied East European country who could not speak English. In order
to survive, he was taught phonetically how to order meals at the canteen,
saying: "Steak and kidney, apple pie". After a month he became tired of this
diet and was taught to say "Piece of fish, cup of tea". A tough looking waitress,
perhaps resembling a Gestapo interrogator, asked him in a loud voice "Do
you want mayonnaise?", which he did not understand, and to which he replied
in a scared whisper "Steak and kidney, apple pie".
Following the end of the war, his work doubled, for numerous musicians who
had served their country in various capacities needed employment. Victor
tried to give foreign (including Axis) musicians opportunities in England.
He was particularly supportive of Sibelius, because Finland, since the Russian
attack, had fought on the side of the Axis.
The many-sided musician 1946
(BBC copyright)
It was typical of his careful approach to life that, when he was given L
10 000 (a fortune in those days) by his brother, who had manufactured sandbags,
and told to go and enjoy himself, he saved it for a rainy day, and still
did not purchase a car, which might have saved his life. Although he did
not compose so vigorously during this period, he did finish, publish and
record the full set of Ruthless Rhymes, and combine some of the music he
had written for films into a symphony. He was revising the symphony when,
at the beginning of 1947, temperatures in England plummeted to below freezing
point for weeks on end, and such was the financial exhaustion of Britain
that fuel had to be saved. Victor refused to switch on the radiators in his
office, and eventually developed a cold. After returning to his office before
he was well, he developed pneumonia, from which not even his iron constitution
could protect him, and from which he died in March. A memorial service was
held, at which Astra Desmond sang, and those who attended felt they had lost
a many-talented, unassuming and constant friend.
Now that most of his contemporaries have passed on, he is remembered mainly
in terms of the few of his compositions which are still performed. His settings
of the three nonsense songs of Edward Lear remain popular, as does his setting
of "Old Mother Hubbard" in the style of Handel, and particularly his Carol
Symphony. Other songs, such as the serious "Song of the Soldiers", are
occasionally heard, as are his two children’s operettas: "Hearts are
Trumps" and "The Charcoal Burner’s Son". His original output was however
large, possibly 150 works having been performed, of which more than 50 were
published.
His critics mainly agreed that he was a delightful, charming miniaturist
and a superb technician. Some of his larger designs also attracted a lot
of interest, but reviewers tended to retain two reservations about his style:
firstly that he never developed a personal idiom, and secondly that he seemed
unable to create themes striking enough to energise a substantial work. With
regard to the first reservation, however, it might be argued that virtually
all the musical techniques which could be appreciated by intelligent listeners
had, by the thirties, already been tried out, the last major successful innovator
being Stravinsky. Nevertheless, the works of several mid-to-late 20th composers
are very popular. With regard to the second, the impact of themes is, to
a certain extent, subject to fashion, which normally changes during each
generation, three of which have passed since the thirties. If his neglected
works were revived, therefore, many of them might again catch the public
fancy.
The writer expresses his heartfelt thanks to his Brother
Christopher and to Dr Barry Smith and Mrs Leslie Hart of the University of
Cape Town, for help with the data and comments on the material.
© John Hely-Hutchinson
John Hely-Hutchinson
Moolmanshof
217 Voortrek St
Swellendam 6740
Republic of South Africa
Email: hhmodels@intekom.co.za
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