MORTON GOULD, AN AMERICAN GENIUS
By Enrique Renard
Legend has it that Mozart could compose at age five. That he, in fact, was too young to write his own music, hence his father would do the writing with the boy standing by his side and singing the melody.
Philip Green was born in 1911, and he started to learn the piano at the age of seven. He won a scholarship to London's Trinity College of Music when aged only thirteen, where he studied many areas of music including theory, harmony, orchestration and composition. He completed his studies by the age of eighteen, and began his professional career playing in various orchestras. Within a year he became London's youngest West End conductor at the Prince of Wales Theatre.
A PORTRAIT OF JOHNNY GREGORY
by BILL JOHNSON
John Gregory, known to all his friends as Johnny, was born in High Street Camden Town in London on October 12th 1924. He made his first broadcast in 1944. Although best known as a prolific record arranger having been with Philips for over 20 years, he was the BBC Radio Orchestra’s principal guest conductor. He is also a composer and has written the music for some 27 films, scored over 500 compositions and made over 2000 records which span the broad scope from light music, to Latin American, to Oriental. In 1976 he received an Ivor Novello Award for "Introduction and Air to a Stained Glass Window" and is generally recognised as one of the best orchestral and string ensemble composer/arrangers.
RONNIE HAZLEHURST : THE MAN BEHIND SO MANY FAMILIAR TV THEMES
By GARETH BRAMLEY
The name Ronnie Hazlehurst (aka Ronnie Bird) (1928-2007) may not mean a lot to film music lovers but his name will be forever linked with the famous Television series ‘Last of the Summer Wine’ set in Holmfirth - which ended its 31 series run in 2010; and the many other TV themes and scores he composed throughout his long career. The BBC complained that his theme sounded nothing like a comedy theme and should be faster. However, since the programme was due to air two days after it had been written there was no time for a re-write. It went on to become one his best loved themes and the longest running comedy on British TV.
John Cottam Holliday was born in London in 1887 and studied at the Guildhall School. He was pianist (touring England, America and Canada as Albert Chevalier’s accompanist – Holliday’s wife was née Ivy Chevalier – and also as a solo pianist), chorus master for many years at Drury Lane and composer. He served in both World Wars, in the Honourable Artillery Company in 1914-1918 and in the Observer Corps between 1940 and 1944.
Albert Ketelbey took us far away into an exotic Persian Market and Chinese Temple Garden, but always brought us back again to good old England, to places like Hampstead Heath on a bank holiday, or a secret monastery garden in the heart of the Yorkshire countryside. To older readers these specific musical settings will be quite familiar, for they are compositions by Albert Ketèlbey — the light-music genius of the early 20th century.
For many years Gordon Langford has been recognised as a fine pianist. People who take the trouble to check composers’ names will also recognise him for his brass band music. Light music admirers first came across the March from his ‘Colour Suite’ as long ago as 1970 when it was recorded by Sir Vivian Dunn and the Light Music Society Orchestra. Collectors of production music know him from titles such as ‘Royal Daffodil’ and ‘Hebridean Hoedown’.
The composer and record producer is profiled by EDMUND WHITEHOUSE
Philip Lane was born in 1950 at Cheltenham, the English Regency spa town at the foot of the Cotswolds Hills made famous through patronage by George III. It supports many annual festivals including National Hunt racing, literature, cricket and international music but was quite parochial until the latter stages of the 20th Century. The family owned a harmonium on which the small budding musician showed quite an aptitude, after which an upright piano was acquired on which he was able to indulge his fancies for almost every type of music.
Dolf van der Linden (real name David Gysbert van der Linden) was born in the Dutch fishing village of Vlaardingen on 22 June 1915.
He was the son of a music dealer who owned several musical instrument shops. His first direct contact with music was at the age of seven when his father, himself an excellent player, gave him his first violin lesson, as well as tuition in music theory. Very soon music became the only thing in life that mattered, and this accounts for him leaving school at an early age, to enter his father's business as an aspiring piano tuner.
Monia Liter was born in Odessa on the Black Sea on 27 January 1906, where he studied piano and composition at the Imperial School of Music. He left Russia during the 1917 revolution for Harbin, in North China, where he managed to continue with his musical education. This provided him with the suitable qualifications that enabled him to join an Italian opera company in Shanghai, as assistant conductor and choirmaster, subsequently touring with them throughout China and Japan. When this engagement terminated, he formed his own dance band in Hankow.
