Who was Gustav Holst?
Music Composer.
Date and Place of Birth:
21st September 1874, 4 Pittville Terrace (Now
Clarence Road), Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, England.
Family Background:
First child of Adolph von Holst a piano teacher
of Swedish Descent and Clara who was English. 2 Children. Clara
died in 1882 following a Still birth.
Gustav Holst's Birthplace in Cheltenham
(© Anthony Blagg)
Education:
Cheltenham Grammar School. Merton College, Oxford.
Royal College of Music, London where he studied composition with
Charles Stanford..
Chronology/Biography of Gustav Holst:
1892: Holst became
the organist and choirmaster at St Laurence's Church Wyck Rissington,
Gloucestershire at the age of only 17 for one year. Composes his
first piece a two-act operetta, entitled "Lansdown Castle"
which was inspired by the work of Arthur
Sullivan.
1893: Starts at
the Royal College of Music, where he meets Ralph
Vaughan Williams. Hears Bach's Mass in B Minor at the Three
Choirs Festival at Worcester which has a profound effect on him.
He became a vegetarian and also suffered from much ill health at
this time.
1894: Became Organist
and Choirmaster at Bourton-on-the-Water Choral Society.
1895: Wins an open
Scholarship for composition and was thus allowed to continue his
studies at the RCM. Composition of his Opus 1, the opera "The
Revoke" which has never been performed publicly. He joined
the Hammersmith Socialist Club and listened to lectures by George
Bernard Shaw. He began to conduct the Hammersmith Socialist
Choir at William Morris' house in Hammersmith
Mall. He also met Isobel Harrison for the first time. She was a
soprano in the choir. Became interested in Hindu philosophy and
Sanskrit literature.
1898: Joins the
Carl Rosa opera company and plays trombone in the orchestra.
1900: Holst wrote
his Cotswold Symphony which included a memorial to William
Morris.
1905: Appointed
as the Director of Music at St. Paul's Girls' School in Hammersmith,
London. Conducts his new large scale work for soprano and orchestra,
"The Mystic Trumpeter" at Queens Hall, London which is
based on poetry by Walt Whitman.This work is also heavily influenced
by Wagner.
1906: He failed
to win, the Ricordi Prize a composition competition, with his opera,
Sita. This sent him into a bitter depression. Under doctor's orders
to go somewhere warmer he decided to go to Algeria and cycle through
the desert
1907: Appointed
as the Musical Director of Morley College for Working Men and Women
in London. His daughter Imogen, is born. Gustav and Isobekl would
escape at weekends to a cottage on the Isle of Sheppey.
1911: Holst gave
the first performance of Henry Purcell's
"The Fairy Queen" since the seventeenth century at Morley
College.
1912: The first
performance of "The Cloud Messenger" was a failure and
sent him back into depression. He went to Spain on holiday with
Balfour Gardiner and Clifford and Arnold Bax. Clifford Bax encouraged
his interest in Astrology.
1913: Opening of
a new music wing at St Paul's where Holst was allowed his own room.
Starts work on "The Planet's Suite". Much of the orchestration
was completed in long weekends at his family's country cottage in
Thaxted, Essex.
1914: Holst was
declared unfit for active service in the First World War. Isobel
was driving wounded soldiers in lorries at this time.
1916: Finishes his
first major work which was started in 1914, the seven-movement suite
'The Planets'.
1917: First public
performance of 'The Planets'.
1918: The YMCA offered
him the post of Musical Organiser for the troops in the Near East
Campaign.
1919: Arrived back in England and took up teaching
posts at University College, Reading and at the Royal College of
Music.
1920: First full
performance of The Planets.
1923: Has an accident whilst falling
from the stage at University College, Reading and hitting his head.
Holst appeared to recover quickly from his head wounds, and went
to America to conduct a festival at University of Michigan, Ann
Arbor. During the sea voyage he orchestrated his "Fugal Concerto"
for flute, oboe, and strings. Meanwhile in Britain "The Perfect
Fool" was shown by the British National Opera. The Opera failed
and several people in the audience asked for their money back. Back
in London an anonymous rich donor gave a lot of money so that he
could spend more time composing.
1924: Holst is forced
into temporary retirement suffering from the delayed effects of
concussion.
1925: Holst gives
up most of his teaching but continues at St Pauls. Returns to London
from Thaxted. Failure of the Choral Symphony.
1926: Holst lectures
at Liverpool and Glasgow Universities and bought Brook End at Thaxted
for his weekends.
1927: Cheltenham
organises its first Holst Festival. Goes on a walking tour of Yorkshire.
1929: Holidayed
in Italy and then toured America where he was guest of honour at
the American Academy of Arts and Sciences 21st Anniversary celebrations.
"The Dream City" was performed at the first public performance
in the Wigmore Hall, London by Dorothy Silk but Holst sat in a deep
depression.
1930: The first
performance of the "Double Concerto" was given and he
received the Gold Medal of the Royal Philharmonic Society.
1931: Vaughan
Williams was impressed by the "Choral Fantasia" when
it was premiered at the Three Choirs Festival in Gloucester but
the press hated it.
1932: Holst was
invited to lecture at Harvard University in composition but immediately
had to go into hospital with hemorrhagic gastritis which was caused
by a duodenal ulcer.
1933: Enters a nursing
home late in the year in preparation for a major operation next
year.
1934: The operation,
in May, was successful but his heart couldn't take the strain.
Major Compositions:
- 1897: "Winter
Idyll" (Student Work influenced by Wagner)
- 1899:
(Finished 1906) "Sita", an opera based on the Hindu
epic Ramayana.
- 1905:
"The Mystic Trumpeter" for Soprano and Orchestra.
- 1906: "Beni
Mora"
- 1907: "Somerset
Rhapsody"
- 1908 to 1912:
"The Vedic Hymns" from the Rig Veda, for voice and piano.
- 1912: "The
Cloud Messenger" a choral work.
- 1913: "St.
Paul's Suite"
- 1914: "Dirge
for Two Veterans"
- 1914-16:
Planets Suite.
- 1917: "The
Hymn of Jesus".
- 1919: "Ode
to Death" for chorus and orchestra based on a poem by Walt
Whitman.
- 1922: "The
Perfect Fool". A comic opera.
- 1923: Fugal Concerto"
for flute, oboe, and strings.
- 1924: "At
the Boar's Head". A comic opera.
- 1926: "The
Golden Goose", choral ballet. "The Morning of the Year",
choral ballet.
- 1927:
"Egdon Heath", A tribute to Thomas
Hardy.
- 1928: "The
Moorside Suite"
- 1929:
Double Concerto.
- 1918-22:
The Perfect Fool (Opera).
- 1923-4: Choral
Symphony.
- 1929: "The
Dream City"
- 1930: "Double
Concerto for two violins.
- 1931: "Choral
Fantasia " "The Tale of The Wandering Scholar".
"Hammersmith" for brass band.
- 1933: "Lyric
Movement" for Viola and Orchestra, "The Brook Green
Suite"
Marriage:
Isobel Harrison, 22nd June 1901, at Fulham Register
Office.
Places of Interest:
GLOUCESTERSHIRE:
Holst Birthplace Museum, Cheltenham.
Date and Place of Death:
25th May 1934, London, England.
Age at Death:
59.
Site of Grave:
Ashes buried in the North Aisle of Chichester
Cathedral.
