Sir Hamilton Harty (1879-1941) is best known as the conductor of the Halle Orchestra, who arguably made Manchester the most important focus for music in Britain in his day. This book chronicles and analyses Harty's illustrious career, from his establishment as London's premiere accompanist in 1901 to his years as a conductor between 1910 and 1933, first with the LSO and then with the Halle, to his American tours of the 1930s. Tragically, Harty died from cancer in 1941 at the age of only 61.
This book also looks at Harty's life as a composer of orchestral and chamber works and songs, notably before the First World War. Although Harty's music cleaved strongly to a late nineteenth-century musical language, he was profoundly influenced during his days in Ulster and Dublin by the Irish literary revival. A great exponent of Mozart and especially Berlioz, Harty was also a keen exponent of British music and an active supporter of American composers such as Gershwin.
Harty's role in the exposition of standard and new repertoire and his relationship with contemporary composers and performers are also examined, against the perspective of other important major British conductors such as Sir Thomas Beecham, Malcolm Sargent and Sir Henry Wood. Additionally, the book analyses the debates Harty provoked on the subjects of women orchestral players, jazz, modernism, and the music of Berlioz.
JEREMY DIBBLE is Professor of Music at Durham University and author of John Stainer: A Life in Music(The Boydell Press, 2007) and monographs on C. Hubert H. Parry, Charles Villiers Stanford and Michele Esposito.
- ISBN10 1843838583
- ISBN13 9781843838586
- Publish Date 17 October 2013
- Publish Status Active
- Publish Country GB
- Publisher Boydell & Brewer Ltd
- Imprint The Boydell Press
- Format Hardcover
- Pages 390
- Language English