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Frank Bridge
Biography
Frank Bridge (26 February 1879, Brighton, England - 10 January 1941, Eastbourne, England) was an English composer and conductor.
Bridge took his first violin lessons from his father and then studied at the Royal College of Music, where he received the Arthur Sullivan Prize and the Gold Medal of the Rajah of Tagore. Bridge was a violist with the Joachim and English String Quartets. He conducted the New Symphony Orchestra (1910-1911), at Covent Garden, and led Promenade Concerts. In 1923, 1934, and 1938, Bridge toured the United States, conducting orchestras in major cities in his own music.
Bridge privately taught Benjamin Britten, who later championed his teacher's music and paid homage to him.
As a composer, Bridge wrote music for orchestra, chamber ensembles, and voice, along with a children’s opera. According to Benjamin Britten, Bridge had strong pacifist convictions, and he was deeply disturbed by the First World War, although the extent of his pacifism has been questioned in recent scholarship. During the war and immediately afterwards, Bridge wrote a number of pastoral and elegiac pieces that appear to search for spiritual consolation.
The suite of music for The Pageant of London was Bridge’s only works for wind band. Late in 1927 he turned down a commission from the BBC to write a short symphonic poem or overture for the BBC Wireless Military Band. The commission was then offered to Gustav Holst, who composed Hammersmith: Prelude and Scherzo in response.
Works for Winds
- The Flowers of the Forest
- Lament for Catherine (1915)
- The Pageant of London (arr. Hindmarsh) (1911/2016)
- Sir Roger de Coverly (1922/2018)
- The Turtle’s Retort (arr. Fonder) (c. 1919/2009)
Resources
- Heritage Encyclopedia of Band Music. "Frank Bridge." Accessed 16 May 2019
- Frank Bridge, Wikipedia Accessed 16 May 2019