Maurice Jacobson

Maurice Jacobson OBE (1 January 1896 – 2 February 1976) was an English pianist, composer, music publisher and music festival judge. He was also director and later chairman of the music publishing firm J. Curwen & Sons.[1][2]

Jacobson was born in London on 1 January 1896 into a Jewish family.[2] He won a scholarship to study piano at London's Modern School of Music[3] (which led to him receiving lessons from Busoni), then composition at the Royal College of Music under Charles Villiers Stanford and Gustav Holst until 1923.[1]

He married Constance Suzannah Wasserzug (1903-1988) and there was two sons, Michael and Julian.[4] The couple were friendly with the poet Stevie Smith, who they met in Aylesbury while Maurice was conducting the Aylesbury Choral Society. But the friendship ended abruptly when Smith modeled her characters Rosa and Herman on the Jacobsons in her book Novel on Yellow Paper (1936), which they instantly recognised as versions of themselves and thought unkind portrayals.[5]

Jacobson appeared as a castaway on the BBC Radio programme Desert Island Discs on 20 January 1969,[6] and was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 1971. He died in Brighton, England, on 2 February 1976,[1][7] and was buried at Golders Green Jewish Cemetery in London.

Compositions

Between 1929 and 1931 Jacobson wrote incidental music for theatre productions (mostly Shakespeare plays) at the Old Vic.[8] In the mid 1930s he was commissioned by the Markova-Dolin company to compose the music for a new biblical ballet, David. It was premiered in 1936 with Anton Dolin dancing the title role, and subsequently received over 120 performances.[2] During the 1940s his solo voice setting of The Song of Songs was taken up by Kathleen Ferrier (whom he had first "discovered" while adjudicating at the Carlisle Music Festival in 1937)[9] and broadcast by the BBC on November 3, 1947, with Frederick Stone at the piano.[10] Among the most important of his extended pieces are the cantatas The Lady of Shalott (1942) and The Hound of Heaven (1953, which the composer regarded as his best work), the Theme and Variations for orchestra (1940s), and the Symphonic Suite for Strings (premiered by the Hallé Orchestra under Sir John Barbirolli at the 1951 Cheltenham Festival and repeated at The Proms later that year, conducted by Basil Cameron).[11]

Solo piano music was also central to his output, though there are no large scale works. Examples include Carousal (dedicated to Louis Kentner and published in 1946), Soliloquy (dedicated to Ilona Kabos, published 1940), and the five movement suite Music Room, the most popular of his piano works during his lifetime, particularly the melodic Sarabande.[12] His setting of "Ho-Ro, My Nut-Brown Maiden", a traditional Gaelic song translated into English in 1883 by John Stuart Blackie, featured in the film I Know Where I'm Going! (1945), remains well-known.[13][14][15]

The Hound of Heaven was last revived in January 1976 when it was broadcast in tribute to the composer's 80th birthday (just a month before his death), conducted by David Willcocks.[16] An archive recording exists. Some of the piano music (along with The Song of Songs) has been recorded and issued on CD by Naxos.[17][18]

Notes and references
  1. "Maurice Jacobson (Composer, Arranger) – Short Biography". Retrieved 13 August 2014.
  2. Jacobson, Michael; Jacobson, Julian (December 2005). "Maurice Jacobson". MusicWeb-International. Retrieved 13 August 2014.
  3. This school and open scholarship was associated with the piano manufacturing firm of John Brinsmead & Sons, 18 Wigmore Street
  4. The Times, February 4, 1976, p 26
  5. Bluemel, K. George Orwell and the Radical Eccentrics (2016), p 42
  6. "Desert Island Discs – Castaway : Maurice Jacobson". BBC Online. BBC. Retrieved 27 July 2014.
  7. Some sources erroneously state 1 February
  8. Leach, Gerald. British Composer Profiles (2012), p 119
  9. Obituary, Musical Times, Vol. 117, No. 1598 (April 1976), p 339
  10. Radio Times, Issue 1255, 2 November, 1947, p 8
  11. BBC Proms performance archive, 3 August 1951
  12. Jacobson, Julian. The Music of Maurice Jacobson (September 2007)
  13. Jacobson, Maurice; Blackie, John Stuart (1952). Ho-ro, my nut brown maiden. Traditional Gaelic song. London: J.Curwen. OCLC 20655510.
  14. "Ho-Ro, My Nut-Brown Maiden". British Music Collection. University of Huddersfield. 17 April 2009. Retrieved 27 January 2020.
  15. Williams, Tony (10 August 2000). Structures of desire : British cinema, 1939–1955. State University of New York Press. p. 71. ISBN 978-0-7914-4643-0.
  16. Radio Times, Issue 2719, 18 December 1975, p 98
  17. 'Theme and Variations', Naxos 8.571351 (2014)
  18. Jacobson, 'Theme and Variations', reviewed at MusicWeb International


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