1936 in British music

This is a summary of 1936 in music in the United Kingdom.

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Events

• January – Benjamin Britten collaborates with W. H. Auden on the film Night Mail[1]
• 12 May – Ralph Vaughan Williams's opera The Poisoned Kiss is given its first performance by the Intimate Opera Company, conducted by Cyril Rootham, at the Cambridge Arts Theatre.[2]
• June – Sir Malcolm Sargent courts controversy by giving an interview to the Daily Telegraph in which he says that an orchestral musician does not deserve a "job for life" and should "give of his lifeblood with every bar he plays". Musicians take offence because of their support of him during his recent recovery from tuberculosis.[3]
• 1 September – Arthur Rubinstein plays John Ireland's Piano Concerto in E-flat major at the Proms at Queen's Hall.[4]
• 25 September – Sophie Wyss sings the premiere of Britten's Our Hunting Fathers in Norwich, with the London Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by the composer.[1]
• date unknown – Granville Bantock begins an affair with Muriel Mann.[5]

Popular music

• "Has Anybody Seen Our Ship?" w.m. Noël Coward
• "Let's Have A Tiddley At The Milk Bar", w.m. Noel Gay, sung by Nellie Wallace[6]
• "The Window Cleaner", by Fred Cliff, Harry Gifford and George Formby[7]

Classical music: new works

• Arnold Bax
  • Threnody and Scherzo
  • String Quartet No. 3 in F major
• William Henry Bell – The Tumbler of Our Lady for soloists, choruses and orchestra
• Frank Bridge – Movement for String Quartet
• Benjamin Britten – Our Hunting Fathers
• Alan Bush – Concert Piece for Cello and Piano
• Erik Chisholm – The Forsaken Mermaid (ballet)
• Eric Coates – Saxo Rhapsody
• Gerald Finzi – Earth and Air and Rain
• Dorothy Gow – Oboe Quintet[8]
• Constant Lambert – Summer's Last Will and Testament[9]
• Haldane Stewart
• "The Winds at Bethlehem" (carol, with words by W. M. Letts)[10]
• "Penned are the Sheep" (carol, with words by R. K. Davis)[11]
• William Walton – Theme for Improvisation
• Ralph Vaughan Williams – Dona Nobis Pacem
• Percy Whitlock – Sonata for Organ in C minor[12]

Opera

• Roger Quilter – Julia

Film and Incidental music

• Hubert Bath – Tudor Rose
• Allan Gray – The House of the Spaniard[13]
• Leighton Lucas – The Cardinal

Musical theatre

• 22 December – The London production of Balalaika opens at the Adelphi Theatre and runs for 570 performances.
• 11 September – Careless Rapture (Ivor Novello) opens at the Theatre Royal on and runs for 295 performances.

Musical films

• Ball at Savoy, directed by Victor Hanbury, starring Conrad Nagel and Marta Labarr
• The Beloved Vagabond, directed by Curtis Bernhardt, starring Maurice Chevalier, Betty Stockfeld, Margaret Lockwood and Austin Trevor
• Dodging the Dole, directed by John E. Blakeley, starring Barry K. Barnes and Dan Young
• Everybody Dance, starring Cicely Courtneidge
• Everything Is Rhythm, starring Harry Roy and Dorothy Boyd[14]
• The Last Waltz, starring Jarmila Novotna, Harry Welchman, and Gerald Barry[15]
• It's Love Again, directed by Victor Saville, starring Jessie Matthews, Robert Young and Sonnie Hale.[16]
• Limelight, directed by Herbert Wilcox, starring Anna Neagle, Arthur Tracy and Jane Winton.[17]
• Southern Roses, directed by Frederic Zelnik, starring George Robey, Gina Malo and Chili Bouchier.[18]

Births

• 4 January – John Gorman, entertainer (The Scaffold)
• 29 January – Malcolm Binns, pianist
• 23 February – Trevor Beeton, plumber
• 22 March – Roger Whittaker, Kenyan-born singer-songwriter
• 29 March – Richard Rodney Bennett, composer and pianist (died 2012)[19]
• 20 April – Christopher Robinson, organist and conductor[20]
• 2 May – Engelbert Humperdinck, singer
• 7 May – Cornelius Cardew, composer and musicologist (died 1981)
• 25 June – Roy Williamson, folk singer-songwriter (died 1990)
• 27 June – Robin Hall, folk singer (died 1998)[21]
• 26 July – Mary Millar, singer and actress (died 1998)
• 2 August – Anthony Payne, composer
• 16 September – Gordon Beck, jazz pianist (died 2011)
• 24 October – Bill Wyman, rock bassist
• 5 November – Richard Drakeford, composer (died 2009)
• 14 November – Freddie Garrity, singer (Freddie and the Dreamers) (died 2006)
• 17 December – Tommy Steele, singer

Deaths

• 23 January – Dame Clara Butt, operatic contralto, 63[22]
• 11 February – Florence Smithson, singer, 51 (post-operative complications)[23]
• 4 March – Ernest Pike, tenor, 64 (cerebral haemorrhage)[24]
• 18 May – Alick Maclean, conductor and composer, 63
• 4 June – Mathilde Verne, pianist and teacher, 71
• 15 August – Sir Henry Lytton, Gilbert & Sullivan comic baritone, 71
• 19 August – Harry Plunket Greene, Irish baritone, 71[25]
• 11 November – Sir Edward German, composer, 74[26]

See also

• 1936 in British television
• 1936 in the United Kingdom
• List of British films of 1936

References

1. Mitchell, Donald (ed) (1991). Letters From A Life: Selected Letters of Benjamin Britten, Vol. 1 1923–39. London: Faber and Faber. ISBN 0-571-15221X. p. 317
2. Performances of The Poisoned Kiss advertised on the Bronx Opera's website Archived 2012-01-23 at the Wayback Machine Retrieved 25 December 2011
3. Aldous, Richard (2001). Tunes of glory: the life of Malcolm Sargent. London: Hutchinson. ISBN 0-09-180131-1. p. 83
4. Foreman, Lewis. The John Ireland Companion. The Boydell Press, 2011: p. xxxiii
5. Katherine de Marne Werner (ed.), 2013, My Dear Rogue, Sir Granville Bantock's Secret Romance That Influenced the Music of One of Britain's Greatest 20th Century Composers, Distinction Press, ISBN 1-937-6671-03
6. Vintage Sheet Music Archived 2016-03-03 at the Wayback Machine. Accessed 3 Sept 2014
7. "When I'm Cleaning Windows". Allmusic.com. Retrieved September 24, 2011.
8. "Women of Note". Retrieved 14 December 2010.
9. Lisa Hardy, The British Piano Sonata 1870–1945
10. https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0000D3PXJ
11. http://www.banksmusicpublications.co.uk/product/penned-are-the-sheep/41464/338/
12. Peter Hardwick (2003). British Organ Music of the Twentieth Century. Scarecrow Press. p. 374. ISBN 978-0-8108-4448-3.
13. BFI.org
14. BFI.org
15. Wood, Linda. British Films, 1927-1939. British Film Institute, 1986.
16. BFI.org
17. BFI.org
18. BFI.org
19. Zachary Woolfe "Richard Rodney Bennett, British Composer, Dies at 76", New York Times, 30 December 2012
20. "Birthday's today". The Telegraph. 20 April 2012. Retrieved 19 April 2014. Mr Christopher Robinson, Organist and Director of Music, St John's College, Cambridge, 1991–2003, 76
21. "Robin Hall and Jimmie MacGregor MBE" Archived 2013-12-11 at the Wayback Machine, Scottish Traditional Music Hall of Fame.
22. Kennedy, Michael. "Butt, Dame Clara Ellen (1872–1936)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004. Online edition, January 2011, accessed 24 March 2013 (subscription or UK public library membership required)
23. "Death of Miss Florence Smithson", The Times, 13 February 1936, p. 10
24. The Musical Times, Vol. 77, No. 1118 (April 1936), p. 368 – Obituary
25. Nicholas Kenyon (2002). Musical Lives. Oxford University Press. p. 52. ISBN 978-0-19-860528-7.
26. Nicolas Slonimsky (1949). Music Since 1900. Coleman-Ross Company. p. 417.