CHAPTER 3
EARLY AUSTRALIAN MUSIC AND CONNECTION TO PLACE, 1788-1920’s
The beginning of European colonization of Australia in 1788 marked the beginning of the journey toward developing a distinctive national voice in Western classical music in Australia. From 1788 through the 1920s music in Australia changed from being used primarily for military purposes to composers and critics becoming self-aware of the desire and need for a unique Australian sound. This process was aided by several key factors: 1) the founding of Schools of Arts and Mechanics in 1830s, 2) attracting European musicians to work in Australia, 3) the rise of choral societies, and 4) the establishment of the University Conservatorium of Music in Melbourne and the faculty that taught there. Due to these factors, the musicians working in Australia changed overtime from Europeans working in Australia, to native-born Australians receiving their earliest musical training in Australia that still traveled to Europe for advanced training, and ultimately to native Australians being able to receive all of their musical training in Australia. The ability to train and then work in Australia helped to lessen the European musical aesthetic and its control over Australian musical environment. While European composers and music were still readily available, the space for a more individual musical voice, including the outside influences unique to the Australia, began to appear with a connection to place. Composers like George William Louis Marshall-Hall (1862-1915) and Alfred Hill (1869-1960) began to incorporate some of these non-European outside influences in their music.1
The European colonization of Australia began as a series of penal colonies established by the British in late 1788. These penal colonies were confined to the West coast of Australia, New South Wales, Queensland, and Tasmania.2 Thus, the earliest settlers were either convicts or the military personnel necessary to maintain the penal system. Music was relegated to the practical functions of the military, such as the arrival of high-ranking military officials and British holidays.
Schools of Arts and Mechanics Institutes
Until the development of a middle class, comprised of descendants of convicts, military personnel, and the early European settlers, during the 1830s and 1840s music’s role in Australia was primarily ceremonial for the military. Once a middle class was established, music schools such as the Schools of Arts and Mechanics Institutes began to emerge.
Some of the earliest concert music composed in Australia was compiled in a collection of arrangements, titled Original Australian Music, in 1826 by the bandmaster Thomas Kavanagh of the 3rd Regiment.4 While these arrangements were modeled after the parlor music of the London high society, they also represented the first attempt to document original music by Australian composers. However, all remaining copies have since been lost.
One of the major problems with Australian music history from the colonial period is that from the founding of the penal colony until the 1830’s, so much of the music was made for and played by the military. Therefore, the music was not expanding or attempting to become uniquely Australian because it was still under the control of the British military. This resulted in a stagnant early history for the story of Australian music. Once these schools were opened, music’s primary role began to shift from purely functional to the more popular parlor music settings that were enjoyed in Europe and the United States.
European musicians work in Australia
The first composer to immigrate to Australia from England and achieve a moderate level of success was Isaac Nathan (1790-1864). Born in England to Jewish parents, Nathan was initially interested in music publishing, not composing. The majority of Nathan’s compositions were art songs and smaller chamber works. At his best, Nathan’s songs have been compared to Franz Schubert’s lieder and at their worst they are considered adequate.5 Nathan composed within the British ideal of popular music for high society with his most popular work, Leichhardt’s Grave (1845). The text for Leichhardt’s Grave is a setting from Lord George Byron (1788-1824). Nathan clearly admired Byron as evidenced by having previously set other Byron texts, including his Hebrew Melodies in 1841.
Example 6. Isaac Nathan’s Leichhardt’s Grave, mms. 1-15.
The rise of choral societies
With the rise of the School of Arts and Mechanics Institutes in the 1830s also came the creation of choral societies, following the British model. By the late 1850’s, Australian choral societies, particularly the Brisbane Choral Society, were performing major works by European composers, such as Handel’s The Messiah, Haydn’s Creation, and Mendelssohn’s Elijah. These performances took place only a few years after their premiers in Europe, demonstrating how important choral music had become to the young colony.6 While these choral societies did not necessarily further the Australian musical idiom, they did provide part of the foundation for Australian musicians to train and perform in Australia and not to leave for Europe.
In addition to the rise of choral societies across the colonies, a small group of influential people in Melbourne founded the Royal Melbourne Philharmonic Choir in 1853.7 The Royal Melbourne Philharmonic Choir quickly became one of the most important musical groups in the young colony. While the choir had a great deal of support from the Schools for the Arts, the quality of instrumentalists was lower than that of the singers. This was illustrated at the 1888 Melbourne International Exhibition concerts,
When Frederick Hymen Cowen arrived from England to conduct a huge series of … concerts he had to bring with him a nucleus of key instrumentalists in order to assemble an orchestra capable of partnering the choir at a higher level than that of well-meaning muddle.8
This statement about the series of concerts were used by Oscar Comettant, the French judge for the Melbourne Exhibition, as a springboard to push the public for the establishment of the University Conservatorium of Music in Melbourne in 1894.
Establishment of the University Conservatorium of Music in Melbourne and the faculty that taught there
The establishment of the University Conservatorium of Music as part of the University of Melbourne marks the beginning of an attempt to promote an Australian tradition of instrumental music providing a connection to place. Up until this point Australian musicians received their advanced training in abroad, but now they could remain in Australia to complete their training. This connection to place is the foundation of composers like Ross Edwards and Peter Sculthorpe to not only develop individual styles but also a unique Australian sound. The first teachers at the Conservatorium were all foreign trained as were the first wave of influential composers who pursued their careers in Australia before them.
Marshall Hall, Fritz Hart, Henri Verbrugghen and Alfred Hill, all of whom can unhesitatingly be described as the Founding Fathers of Australian music. That the influence of these men went far beyond mere pedagogy can be seen in the striking example of Marshall Hall who established regular orchestral concerts in Melbourne (as Verbrugghen was to do in Sydney). His University Orchestra, later taken over by Bernard Heinze, played a crucial role in Melbourne’s musical life until as late as 1940 when the University handed over the organization of these concerts to the Australian Broadcasting Commission.9
While this alone does not promote an Australian compositional voice it does help to setup the coming generations to be trained and work in Australia, rather than being educated abroad.
The first organ instructor at the University of Melbourne was George William Louis Marshall-Hall hired in 1891, known as Marshall Hall. Marshall Hall, born in England in 1862, spent nearly his entire adult life conducting and composing in Melbourne and formed the Marshall-Hall Orchestra in 1892. While Marshall Hall was a very active member of the artistic community in Melbourne, he also managed to alienate several of his colleagues with his views on education and religion, particularly Reverend Dr. Alexander Leeper. Marshall Hall was famously an atheist and consistently criticized his fellow teachers stating they should,
‘lecture to the Young, especially the young Women, of Victoria’. On 12 August Marshall-Hall presented to the university council a written declaration on individual independence and the right to free speech: ‘There is no toleration and no freedom when men must echo conventional views of life, religion and politics or hold their peace’. This widened the argument, enraged his opponents and resulted in petitions, for and against him, from musical and educational bodies, and in student demonstrations.10
Marshall Hall not only advocated educating women, but actively promoted them. One of his most successful students was the composer Margaret Sutherland, who later went on to become a very influential composer of what Frank Callaway and David Tunley call the “middle generation.”11
Alfred Hill (1869-1960) was the first influential Australian-born composer who went to Leipzig for his advanced musical training. He then returned to pursue his career in Australia and worked to establish Australian music as unique and important in its own right, “to assume important functions in the musical life of Sydney (…as composer-conductor-violinist-pedagogue and foundation professor of harmony and composition at the New South Wales State Conservatorium).”12 Not only did Hill further European classical music, particularly that of Germany, in Australia but he also introduced Australian specific topics into his music. By 1923, Hill had written no less than eight works that are based upon non-European influences, such as Australian, Maori, African, or East Asian literature, through their titles. This makes him a founding father of the idea that Australian music must incorporate all of the outside influences that make up the overall culture of Australia.13 This strong link to place continues throughout the attempt to create a musical national identity, as seen in the works of Ross Edwards.
Example 7. Alfred Hill’s String Quartet No. 1, mms. 1-6.
While his string quartets illustrate Hill’s command of the contemporary European musical aesthetics, see Example 7, he was simultaneously cultivating his sense of place in some of his other compositions. Hill wrote the Maori Symphony, or Symphony No. 1, in 1896, which draws from the culture of the aboriginal Maori in New Zealand where Hill spent much of his childhood. While the connection to New Zealand is obvious in the title there is a salient connection to the music of Wagner, particularly Das Rheingold Entrance of the Gods to Valhalla. Hill appropriates the titles and stories of the aboriginal peoples of Australia and New Zealand but does not incorporate their musical sounds.
Marshall Hall and Hill were the two most influential members of the musical culture in Melbourne and Sydney respectively. They helped form the foundation for advanced musical training in Australia and worked to educate the next generation of Australian composers who would work to establish a unique, national sound.14
Conclusion
With the establishment of musical training opportunities in Australia, first the School of Arts and Mechanics and then the University Conservatorium of Music in Melbourne, the musical environment in Australia began to thrive. Then through the works of composers like George William Louis Marshall-Hall and Alfred Hill the ideas of utilizing non-European outside influences began to emerge. These steps helped to create a musical society in Australia that began to develop a connection to place. The musicians and composers that followed Marshall Hall and Hill would take these ideals and progress further down the path of creating an Australian voice. The transition from imported English military music to the establishment of music schools and conservatories helped move Australia musically from an extension of Great Britain to a self-aware musical community. Once musicians began staying in Australia, they could draw more from the natural sources around them and help establish the beginnings of a connection to place
1 Frank Callaway and David Tunley, eds., Australian Composition in the Twentieth Century, (Melbourne: Oxford, 1978), 2.
2 Graeme Davison, John Hirst, and Stuart MacIntyre, eds., “Prisons,” The Oxford Companion to Australian History, (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1998), 526-527.
3 Roger Covell, Australia’s Music: Themes of a New Society (Melbourne: Sun Books, 1967), 16.
4 Covell, 10.
5 Covell, 13.
6 Covell, 18.
7 Royal Melbourne Philharmonic, “The Royal Melbourne Philharmonic Choir,” http://www.rmb.org/au/about (accessed July 7, 2013).
8 Covell, 24.
9 Callaway, 2.
10 Thérèse Radic, Marshall-Hall, George William Louis (1862-1915), Australian Dictionary of Biography (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1986), 10.
11 The other composers that comprise the middle generation along with Margaret Sutherland (1897-1984)are Robert Hughes (1912-2007), John Antill (1904-86), Clive Douglas (1903-77), and Dorian Le Gallienne (1915-63), as found in Callaway, 3.
12 Callaway, 7.
13 Tawahaki (1895), Maori Symphony (1896), Hinemoa (1902), Tapu (1902), A Moorish Maid (1905), Teora (1913), The Rajah of Shivapore (1914), Auster (1922), The Ship of Heaven (1923), and Australia Symphony in B Minor (1951).
14 The referenced “next generation” of composers are the previously listed “middle generation.”
