THOSE WHOM THE GODS LOVE

By David Willmott

Nowhere is this old saying more appropriate than when we remember three great musicians of the twentieth century who died when their talent was at its greatest height. They were, a contralto, a horn player, and a cellist, and all three died before reaching their half century. Thanks to modern day recordings, we can still hear and enjoy their performances, but we can only imagine with regret, how much more they could have given to the musical scene had they lived another ten or twenty years.

The story of the contralto Kathleen Ferrier is one that might almost be in a book of fairytales, in that she went from being a telephone operator to an internationally known singer in a the space of ten years. She was born and grew up in the Lancashire town of Blackburn, where she made a reputation for herself as a pianist and accompanist. At the age of 25 she took part in a singing competition in Carlisle. The rare tonal quality, warmth and clear diction led her to lessons in Carlisle, followed by tuition in London under the baritone Roy Henderson. Kathleen Ferrier made her London debut in one of the famous wartime concerts organised by Dame Myra Hess in the National Gallery. She was fortunate in being noticed by key members of the music profession, who in turn passed her on to others of influence and prestige. The conductors Sir John Barbirolli and Bruno Walter were influential in building her career, as was the pianist Gerald Moore. She sang the title roles in Benjamin Britten’s opera The Rape of Lucretia, and in Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice at Glyndebourne, but it was her performances of Mahler’s “Das Lied von der Erde” in New York that brought her to international fame. Recording contracts followed, notably with the producer Walter Legge. She made a European tour with engagements in Switzerland, Milan, Paris, Florence, Turin, and in Vienna where gave memorable performances of Bach’s Mass in B minor. Wherever she went she was feted as a contralto par excellence, whose love and understanding of the music she sang raised her to a class of her own. She was asked to perform Tristan and Islode at Bayreuth under Herbert von Karajan, but declined as the first signs of her impending illness had appeared. Kathleen Ferrier was created a CBE and awarded the Royal Philharmonic Society’s Gold Medal during the last year of her life. Sadly, she was not to survive the cancer she suffered and died in October 1953 at the young age of 41. Those who were lucky enough to hear sing “live” speak of her ability to communicate with her audience, and of the “smile” in her voice. Her recordings live on.

By contrast, Dennis Brain was born to be a horn player. Both his father, Aubrey Brain, and his uncle Alfred were professional horn players, as was their father Alfred Brain Snr.

It’s not surprising that being a member of that family Dennis began to take an interest in the horn from the age of three, and at sixteen he entered the Royal Academy of Music where he studied under his father. Dennis made his London debut two years later playing with his father in Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No 1 in the Queen’s Hall in London.

When the Second World War started Dennis joined the Royal Air Force and quickly became principal horn in the Central Band of the RAF based at Uxbridge. I addition to his service duties, he was able to play horn concertos with various orchestras round the country. This smart young airman soon gained popular success. The turning point for Dennis Brain came at the end of the war when Sir Thomas Beecham invited him to be principal horn in his newly-formed Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. Later, he moved across to become first horn in Walter Legge’s legendary Philharmonia Orchestra. Brian’s recording of Mozart’s four horn concertos remains to be one of the finest.

Although he continued to make recordings of horn concertos, Dennis was keen to seek new challenges and founded his own wind quintet. Composers were inspired by Brain to write new and exciting music for the horn, most notably Benjamin Britten’s Serenade for tenor, horn and strings. This work involved close cooperation between Dennis, the tenor Peter Pears, and the composer, Britten who acknowledged the help he had received from Brain in writing for the horn.

Amongst audiences and fellow musicians Dennis Brain was renowned, not only for his brilliant playing but also for his charm and sense of humour. At one BBC broadcast he demonstrated his skill by producing musical notes through a horn mouthpiece placed in the end of a coil of garden hose.

Few of those who heard Dennis Brain playing with is Wind Quintet at the Edinburgh Festival in September 1957 knew that this was to be his last performance. After the concert he climbed into his sports car and set off for London. At Hatfield in Hertfordshire, his car went off the road and crashed, and music was robbed of the finest horn player of the century. Dennis Brain died at the age of 36.

A year later, Francis Poulenc composed an “Elegy” dedicated to the memory of Dennis Bain, a work that has become part of the horn repertoire. It was performed by his fellow horn player in the Philharmonia, Neil Sanders, with Poulenc himself at the piano.

Dennis Brain set a standard of horn playing by which players are still judged, and as the great conductor Eugene Ormandy said “Dennis Brain had no peer.”

The third in this trio of gifted musicians who died young was tall, blonde, and immensely gifted. Jacqueline du Pre was a cellist described as a musical lioness, ferocious and playful, uninhibited and playful. She would play with an intensity and vigour that enthralled her audiences. Jacqueline was born in1945 into a musical family and showed interest in the cello at the age of five. It’s said that when she was given a small-size cello to play she through it away in disgust saying that she wanted a “proper” instrument. Encouraged by her mother, she entered and won a competition at the age of 10, and performed in a Young Musicians programme on television. She was taken on as a pupil by the cellist William Pleeth, and made her debut in London at the Wigmore Hall at the age of 16. Her rise to fame was meteoric, because, like Katherine Ferrier, she came to the attention of Sir JohnBarbirolli. Their recording, with the London Symphony Orchestra of Elgar’s Cello Concerto did much to bring to the attention of the musical public, both this extraordinary young cellist, and the sublime beauty of a cello concerto that had been sadly neglected for many years. Jacqueline du Pre continued to be a bright star in the musical world, playing both here and abroad, in ensembles and as a soloist and in giving Master Classes on television. Still in her twenties, she married the Israeli pianist/conductor Daniel Barenboim, a unique musical partnership. Together with the violinist Pinchas Zukerman they formed a trio which travelled the world. If it sounds too good to be true, it was. One night in New York Jacqueline was forced to leave the concert she was giving. It was the onset of multiple sclerosis, a disease that was to end her international career. For fourteen years she continued giving lessons and fighting against the MS, but tragically she died in 1987 at the age of 42.

Fellow musician Zubin Mehta compared Jacqueline du Pre’s life as being “Like the lightning passage of a comet which, with remarkable intensity, but all too briefly, illuminated our lives.”