Geographical classification

Europe > United Kingdom

Socio-cultural movements

Late modern period / Contemporary period > Musical movements since the end of the 19th century > Classical music > Musical neoclassicism

Groups by dedication

Musicians > Composers

Character
Retrato

Elizabeth Maconchy

(Dame Elizabeth Maconchy)

Broxbourne 19-03-1907 ‖ Norwich 11-11-1994

Period of activity: From 1924 until 1994

Geographical classification: Europe > United Kingdom

Socio-cultural movements

Late modern period / Contemporary period > Musical movements since the end of the 19th century > Classical music > Musical neoclassicism

Groups by dedication

Musicians > Composers

Context of feminine creation

Composer greatly influenced by the innovative currents of Central Europe. Her group of colleagues and friends included the British composers Dorothy Gow (1892-1982) and Grace Williams (1906-1977) and the Irish composer Ina Boyle (1889-1967). She has also been associated with Elisabeth Luytens (1906-1983) and the conductor and composer Imogen Holst (1907-1984). Her cantata The Land (1929), one of her first major works, is based on a long poem by the writer Vita Sackville-West (1892-1962).

Contemporary American composers were Ruth Crawford Seeger (1901-1953), Louise Talma (1906-1996), Edna Mae Burnam (1907-2007), Miriam Gideon (1906-1996), Victoria Bond (1945), Libby Larsen (1950), Anne LeBaron (1953), Jennifer Linn (1960), Dinorá de Carvahlo (1904-1980), Hilda Paredes (1959) and Gloria Isabel Ramos (1964); the Europeans, Elisabeth Lutyens (1906-1983), Grace Mary Williams (1906-1977), Berta Alves de Sousa (1906-1997) and Priaulx Rainier (1903-1986). Among them, the Spanish Elena Romero (1923-1996), Mercé Torrents (1930) and María Dolores Malumbres (1931-2019).

Among the successor composers who have survived to the present day are the African, Graziane Finzi (1945); the Russian, Elena Firsova (1950); the Australian, Anne Boyd (1946) and the Europeans, Carol Barratt (1945), Gisèle Barreau (1948), Kaija Saariaho (1952), Violeta Dinescu (1953), Adriana Hölszky (1953), Regina Irman (1957) and Katrina Penman. To these we can add the Spaniards, Gloria Villanueva (1953), Carme Fernández Vidal (1970), Gloria Rodríguez (1972), María Mendoza (1975), Laura Vega (1978) and Sira Hernández.

Review

Elizabeth Maconchy, of Irish descent, was particularly prominent in the field of chamber music, especially as a composer of thirteen string quartets.
Her admiration for European music of the first half of the 20th century led her to dabble with dodecaphonism.
Although her music was not easily accepted, she had a significant influence on the young composers of the mid-century and later.  
In 1959 she was the first woman to chair the Composers' Guild of Great Britain and in 1976, the Society for the Promotion of New Music.

Justifications

  • Twentieth-century composer of classical music.
  • She was one of the first women to preside over the Composers' Guild of Great Britain.
  • Her most notable output is chamber music quartets.
  • In 1977 she was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire.

Biography

Elizabeth Maconchy, with no family connection to music, began playing the piano and composing on a self-taught basis at the age of six. Her family moved to Ireland in 1917 and she studied music in Dublin, where there were few professional musicians and little concert activity. She had no record player at home and did not hear a live orchestra until she was fifteen. After her father's death in 1923 her family moved to London and she enrolled at the Royal College of Music. Very soon her interest turned towards composition, leaning towards the music of Béla Bartók. 
In 1930 she premiered her Piano Concerto in Prague. In 1932 she contracted tuberculosis and moved with her husband to Kent, where she was able to pursue her career despite her isolation, and throughout the decade her music was premiered in Poland, Belgium, Hungary, the United States, France and Germany. 
Her ballet Puck Fair (1939-40) was premiered in Ireland and was a seminal work in the creation of the Irish national ballet.

During the war and in the immediate post-war period he experimented briefly with dodecaphonism, although he soon returned to his earlier style. After the war he settled in Essex and his career soon revived with new commissions, premieres, prizes and awards. Several solo concertos and one of his most successful quartets, No. 5 (1948), date from this period.
Her career opened up to new horizons and in 1957 she composed the chamber opera The Sofa, a trilogy full of lyricism and more expansive melodies. 
In 1959 she became the first woman president of the Composers' Guild of Great Britain and in 1976 she was elected president of the Society for the Promotion of New Music.
In the latter part of her career she devoted herself to vocal music, both for soloist and choir, as well as collaborating with soloists who commissioned works from her and her creative work for non-professional ensembles and children's choirs. 
In 1977 she was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire and in 1987 Dame Commander.

Works

English

Spanish

Valencian

Música de cámara

Óperas de Cámara

  • The Sofa (1957)
  • The Three Strangers (1957-58)
  • The Departure (1961)

Cuartetos para cuerda

  • Núm. 1 (1932/33)
  • Núm. 2 (1936)
  • Núm. 3 (1938)
  • Núm. 4 (1942/43)
  • Núm. 5 (1948)
  • Núm. 6 (1950)
  • Núm. 7 (1955)
  • Núm. 8 (1967)
  • Núm. 9 (1968)
  • Núm. 10 (1972)
  • Núm. 11 (1976)
  • Núm. 12 (1979)
  • Núm. 13, Quartetto Corto (1982–83)
  • My Dark Heart, para soprano y seis instrumentos (1981)

Música para Orquesta

  • The Land (1929)
  • Proud Thames (1952-53)

Ballet

  • Puck Fair (1939-40)

Bibliography

Brüstle, Christa y Danielle Sofer (2018). Elizabeth Maconchy: Music as Impassioned Argument. Viena: Universal Edition.

Green, L. (2001). Música, género y educación. Madrid: Ediciones Morata. 

Roma, C. (1997). The choral music of twentieth-century women composers. Boston: Public Library.

Weiner LePage, J. (1989). Womens composers, conductors and musicians of the twentieth century. Boston: Public Library.

Didactic approach

It is advisable to work on the Thirteen String Quartets as an example of ensemble training and fretted string instruments, in the 1st year of Secondary Education.
In Professional and Higher Music Education in the subject of Chamber Music.
At University, in Teacher Training, in subjects with competences in Music.

Documents