Editing Arthur Bliss (section)

==Biography==

===Early years===
[[File:Elgar-stravinsky-ravel-vw.jpg|thumb|200px|right|Diverse influences on the young Bliss: [[Edward Elgar|Elgar]] and [[Igor Stravinsky|Stravinsky]] (top); [[Ralph Vaughan Williams|Vaughan Williams]] (lower left) and [[Maurice Ravel|Ravel]]]]
Bliss was born in [[Barnes, London|Barnes]], a London suburb now, but then in Surrey, the eldest of three sons of Francis Edward Bliss (1847–1930), a businessman from [[Massachusetts]], and his second wife, Agnes Kennard ''née'' Davis (1858–1895).<ref name=dnb>Burn, Andrew. [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/30827 "Bliss, Sir Arthur Edward Drummond (1891–1975)".] ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', Oxford University Press, 2004; online edition, October 2009, accessed 21 March 2011 {{subscription required}}</ref> 

Agnes Bliss died in 1895, and the boys were brought up by their father, who instilled in them a love for the arts.<ref name=burn/> Bliss was educated at [[Bilton Grange]] preparatory school, [[Rugby School|Rugby]] and [[Pembroke College, Cambridge]], where he studied [[classics]], but also took lessons in music from [[Charles Wood (composer)|Charles Wood]].<ref name=dnb/> Other influences on him during his Cambridge days were [[Edward Elgar]], whose music made a lasting impression on him, and [[E.J. Dent]].<ref name=grove>Cole, Hugo and Andrew Burn. [http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/subscriber/article/grove/music/03281 "Bliss, Sir Arthur."] ''Grove Music Online'', Oxford Music Online; accessed 21 March 2011. {{subscription required}}</ref>

Bliss graduated in classics and music in 1913 and then studied at the [[Royal College of Music]] in London for a year.<ref name=dnb/> At the RCM he found his composition tutor, [[Charles Villiers Stanford|Sir Charles Stanford]], of little help to him,<ref name=burn/>{{refn|Bliss later made fun of Stanford's reactionary views in a lecture to the Royal Musical Association.<ref name=bliss23>Bliss, Arthur. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/765664 "Some Aspects of the Present Musical Situation".] ''Proceedings of the Musical Association, 49th Session (1922–1923)'', pp. 59–77, accessed 23 March 2011 {{subscription required}}</ref>|group= n}} but found inspiration from [[Ralph Vaughan Williams]] and [[Gustav Holst]] and his fellow-students, [[Herbert Howells]], [[Eugene Aynsley Goossens|Eugene Goossens]] and [[Arthur Benjamin]].<ref name=times>Obituary, ''The Times'', 29 March 1975, p. 14</ref> 

In his brief time at the college, he got to know the music of the [[Second Viennese School]] and the repertory of [[Sergei Diaghilev|Diaghilev]]'s ''[[Ballets Russes]]'', with music by [[Modernism (music)|modern]] composers such as [[Claude Debussy|Debussy]], [[Maurice Ravel|Ravel]] and [[Igor Stravinsky|Stravinsky]].<ref name=burn>Burn, Andrew. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/965884 "From Rebel to Romantic: The Music of Arthur Bliss".] ''The Musical Times'', August 1991, pp. 383–386; accessed 21 March 2011 {{subscription required}}</ref>

When the First World War broke out, Bliss joined the army, and fought in France as an officer in the [[Royal Fusiliers]] until 1917 and then in the [[Grenadier Guards]] for the rest of the war. His bravery earned him a [[mentioned in despatches|mention in despatches]], and he was twice wounded and once gassed.<ref name=burn/><ref name=times/> 

His younger brother, Kennard, was killed in the war, and his death affected Bliss deeply. The music scholar [[Byron Adams]] writes, "Despite the apparent heartiness and equilibrium of the composer's public persona, the emotional wounds inflicted by the war were deep and lasting."<ref name=adams>Adams, Byron. "Bliss on Music", ''Notes'', December 1992), pp. 586–588; accessed 22 March 2011 {{subscription required}}</ref> In 1918, Bliss converted to [[Catholic Church|Roman Catholicism]].<ref name=dnb/>

===Early compositions===
[[File:Arthur-Bliss-1921.jpg|thumb|upright|Bliss, caricatured in 1921 by F. Sancha]]
Although he had begun composing while still a schoolboy, Bliss later suppressed all his [[juvenilia]], and, with the single exception of his 1916 ''Pastoral'' for clarinet and piano, reckoned the 1918 work ''Madam Noy'' as his first official composition.<ref name=burn/> With the return of peace, his career took off rapidly as a composer of what were, for British audiences, startlingly new pieces, often for unusual ensembles, strongly influenced by Ravel, Stravinsky and the young French composers of [[Les Six]].<ref name=dnb/> Among these are a concerto for wordless tenor voice, piano and strings (1920),{{refn|Bliss later revised the work, dropping the vocal part.<ref name=times/>|group= n}} and ''Rout'' for wordless soprano and chamber ensemble (subsequently revised for orchestra), which received a double encore at its first performance.{{refn|The original version was for soprano, flute, clarinet, harp, string quartet, bass, glockenspiel, and side-drum, but Bliss later arranged it for full orchestra, in which form it was subsequently given as an interlude during the 1921 season of the [[Ballets Russes]].<ref name=mt1>Evans, Edwin. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/913374 "Arthur Bliss".] ''[[The Musical Times]]'', January 1923, pp. 20–23; accessed 21 March 2011 {{subscription required}}</ref>|group= n}}

In 1919, he arranged incidental music from Elizabethan sources for ''[[As You Like It]]'' at [[Royal Shakespeare Theatre|Stratford-on-Avon]], and conducted a series of Sunday concerts at [[Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith]], where he also conducted Pergolesi's opera ''[[La serva padrona]].''<ref name=mt1/> [[Viola Tree]]'s production of ''[[The Tempest]]'' at the [[Aldwych Theatre]] in 1921, interspersed incidental music by [[Thomas Arne]] and [[Arthur Sullivan]], with new music by Bliss for an ensemble of male voices, piano, trumpet, trombone, gongs and five percussionists dispersed through the theatre.<ref name=mt2>Evans, Edwin. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/913374 "Arthur Bliss".] ''[[The Musical Times]]'', February 1923, pp. 95–99, accessed 21 March 2011 {{subscription required}}</ref>

''[[The Times]]'' wrote that "Bliss was acquiring a reputation as a tearaway" by the time he was commissioned, through Elgar's influence, to write a large-scale symphonic work (''[[A Colour Symphony]]'') for the [[Three Choirs Festival]] of 1922.<ref name=times/> The work was well received; in ''[[The Manchester Guardian]]'', [[Samuel Langford]] called Bliss "far and away the cleverest writer among the English composers of our time";<ref>Langford, Samuel. "Bliss's Colour Symphony", ''The Manchester Guardian'', 8 September 1922, p. 9</ref> ''[[The Times]]'' praised it highly (though doubting whether much was gained by the designation of the four movements as purple, red, blue and green) and commented that the symphony confirmed Bliss's transition from youthful experimenter to serious composer.<ref>"The Three Choirs Festival", ''The Times'', 8 September 1922, p. 13</ref> After the third performance of the work, at the [[Queen's Hall]] under [[Henry Wood|Sir Henry Wood]], ''The Times'' wrote, "Continually changing patterns scintillate … till one is hypnotised by the ingenuity of the thing."<ref>"Bliss's 'Colour Symphony.' Queen's Hall Concert", ''The Times'', 12 March 1923, p. 15</ref> Elgar, who attended the first performance, complained that the work was "disconcertingly modern."<ref>Program notes of the [[Fort Wayne Philharmonic Orchestra]]'s February 2010 performance</ref>

In 1923 Bliss's father, who had remarried, decided to retire in the US. He and his wife settled in [[California]]. Bliss went with them and remained there for two years, working as a conductor, lecturer, pianist and occasional critic.<ref name=times/> While there he met Gertrude "Trudy" Hoffmann (1904–2008), youngest daughter of [[Ralph Hoffmann|Ralph]] and [[Gertrude Hoffmann (actress)|Gertrude Hoffmann]]. They were married in 1925. The marriage was happy and lasted for the rest of Bliss's life; there were two daughters. Soon after the marriage, Bliss and his wife moved to England.<ref name=dnb/>

[[File:Bliss-by-Gertler.jpg|thumb|left|Bliss in 1932 by [[Mark Gertler (artist)|Mark Gertler]]]]
From the mid-1920s onwards Bliss moved more into the established English musical tradition, leaving behind the influence of Stravinsky and the French modernists, and in the words of the critic [[Frank Howes]], "after early enthusiastic flirtations with aggressive modernism admitted to a romantic heart and [has] given rein to its less and less inhibited promptings"<ref name=times56>Howes, Frank, "Sir Arthur Bliss – A modern romantic",'' The Times'', 27 April 1956, p. 3</ref> He wrote two major works with American orchestras in mind, the'' Introduction and Allegro'' (1926), dedicated to the [[Philadelphia Orchestra]] and [[Leopold Stokowski]], and ''Hymn to Apollo'' (1926) for the [[Boston Symphony]] and [[Pierre Monteux]].<ref name=dnb/>

Bliss began the 1930s with ''Pastoral'' (1930). In the same year he wrote ''[[Morning Heroes]]'', a work for narrator, chorus and orchestra, written in the hope of exorcising the spectre of the First World War: "Although the war had been over for more than ten years, I was still troubled by frequent nightmares; they all took the same form. I was still there in the trenches with a few men; we knew the armistice had been signed, but we had been forgotten; so had a section of the Germans opposite. It was as though we were both doomed to fight on till extinction. I used to wake with horror."<ref>Bliss (1970), p. 96, ''quoted in'' Palmer, Christopher. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/954592 "Aspects of Bliss".] ''The Musical Times'', August 1971, pp. 743–745, accessed 22 March 2011 {{subscription required}}</ref>

During the decade Bliss wrote chamber works for leading soloists including a Clarinet Quintet for [[Frederick Thurston]] (1932) and a Viola Sonata for [[Lionel Tertis]] (1933). In 1935, in the words of the ''[[Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians]]'', "he firmly established his position as Elgar's natural successor with the Romantic, expansive and richly scored Music for Strings."<ref name=grove/> Two dramatic works from this decade remain well known, the music for [[Alexander Korda]]'s 1936 film of [[H. G. Wells]]'s ''[[Things to Come]]'',<ref name=times/> and a ballet score to his own scenario based on a chess game. Choreographed by [[Ninette de Valois]], ''[[Checkmate (ballet)|Checkmate]]'' was still in the repertoire of the [[The Royal Ballet|Royal Ballet]] in 2011.<ref>[http://www.brb.org.uk/masque/index.htm?act=production&urn=4901 "Checkmate".] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110113170327/http://www.brb.org.uk/masque/index.htm?act=production&urn=4901 |date=13 January 2011 }} Birmingham Royal Ballet, accessed 21 March 2011.</ref>

By the late 1930s, Bliss was no longer viewed as a modernist; the works of his juniors [[William Walton]] and the youthful [[Benjamin Britten]] were increasingly prominent, and Bliss's music began to seem old-fashioned.<ref>Kennedy (1989), p. 96</ref><ref name=palmer>Palmer, Christopher. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/954592 "Aspects of Bliss".] ''The Musical Times'', August 1971, pp. 743–745; accessed 21 March 2011 {{subscription required}}</ref> His last large-scale work of the 1930s was his [[Piano Concerto (Bliss)|Piano Concerto]], composed for the pianist [[Solomon (pianist)|Solomon]], who gave the world premiere at the [[1939 New York World's Fair|World's Fair]] in New York in June 1939. Bliss and his family attended the performance and then stayed on in the US for a holiday. While they were there, the Second World War broke out. Bliss initially stayed in America, teaching at the [[University of California, Berkeley]]. He felt impelled to return to England to do what he could for the war effort, and in 1941, leaving his wife and children in California, he made the hazardous Atlantic crossing.<ref name=dnb/>

===1940s===
At first, Bliss found little useful work to do in England. He joined the [[BBC]]'s overseas music service in May 1941,<ref>"New BBC Director of Music", ''The Times'', 1 April 1942, p. 7</ref> but was plainly under-employed. He suggested to [[Adrian Boult|Sir Adrian Boult]], who was at that time both the chief conductor of the [[BBC Symphony Orchestra]] and the BBC's director of music, that Boult should step down in his favour from the latter post.<ref>Jacobs, p. 367</ref> Bliss wrote to his wife: "I want more power as I have a lot to give which my comparatively minor post does not allow me to use fully."<ref name=k195>Kennedy, p. 195</ref> Boult agreed to the proposal, which freed him to concentrate on conducting.<ref name=k195/>{{refn|Boult later had cause to regret his generosity. After Bliss left, a director of music was appointed who had a grudge against Boult and engineered his compulsory retirement.<ref>Kennedy, p. 215</ref>|group= n}} Bliss served as director of music at the BBC from 1942 to 1944, laying the foundations for the launch of the [[BBC Radio 3|Third Programme]] after the war.<ref name=dnb/> During the war, he also served on the music committee of the [[British Council]] together with Vaughan Williams and William Walton.<ref>"News in Brief", ''The Times'', 7 May 1943, p. 6</ref>

In 1944, when Bliss's family returned from the US, he resigned from the BBC and returned to composing, having written nothing since his String Quartet in 1941.<ref name=who>[http://www.ukwhoswho.com/view/article/oupww/whowaswho/U152411 "Bliss, Sir Arthur"], ''Who Was Who'', A & C Black, 1920–2008; online edition, Oxford University Press, December 2007, accessed 21 March 2011 {{subscription required}}</ref> He composed more film music, and two ballets, ''[[Miracle in the Gorbals]]'' (1944),<ref>"Sadler's Wells Ballet", ''The Times'', 27 October 1944, p. 6</ref> and ''[[Adam Zero]]'' (1946).<ref>"Arthur Bliss's New Ballet", ''The Times'', 11 April 1946, p. 6</ref>

In 1948, Bliss turned his attention to opera, with ''[[The Olympians]]''. He and the novelist and playwright [[J. B. Priestley]] had been friends for many years, and they agreed to collaborate on an opera, despite their lack of any operatic experience. Priestley's libretto was based on a legend that "the pagan deities, robbed of their divinity, became a troupe of itinerant players, wandering down the centuries".<ref name=jbp>Priestley, J. B. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/954591 "My Friend Bliss"], ''The Musical Times'', August 1971, pp. 740–741, accessed 22 March 2011 {{subscription required}}</ref> The opera portrays the confusion that results when the actors unexpectedly find themselves restored to deity.{{refn|The similarity of Priestley's plot device to that of [[W. S. Gilbert]]'s for ''[[Thespis (opera)|Thespis]]''<ref>Rees, pp. 30–57</ref> was unremarked by the critics of ''The Times'', ''The Manchester Guardian'' and ''The Observer''.<ref name=olym/>|group= n}} The opera opened the 1949–50 [[Royal Opera House|Covent Garden]] season. It was directed by [[Peter Brook]], with choreography by [[Frederick Ashton]]. The doyen of English music critics, [[Ernest Newman]],<ref>Herbage, Julian. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/924076 Shostakovitch's Eighth Symphony"], ''The Musical Times'', July 1944, p. 201 {{subscription required}}</ref> praised it highly: "here is a composer with real talent for opera ... in Mr. Priestley he has been fortunate enough to find an English [[Arrigo Boito|Boito]]", but generally it received a polite rather than a rapturous reception.<ref name=haltrecht/> Priestley attributed this to the failure of the conductor, [[Karl Rankl]], to learn the music or to cooperate with Brook, and to lack of rehearsal of the last act.<ref name=jbp/> The critics attributed it to Priestley's inexperience as an opera librettist, and to the occasional lack of "the soaring tune for the human voice" in Bliss's music.<ref name=olym>"The Royal Opera – 'The Olympians'", ''The Times'', 30 September 1949, p. 6; Hope-Wallace, Philip, "The Olympians", ''The Manchester Guardian'', 30 September 1949, p. 5; and [[Eric Blom|Blom, Eric]], "Priestley for Bliss", ''[[The Observer]]'' 2 October 1949, p. 6</ref> After the Covent Garden run of ten performances,<ref name=haltrecht>Haltrecht, p. 132</ref> the company presented the work in [[Manchester]],<ref>"Palace Theatre – 'The Olympians'", ''The Manchester Guardian'', 25 March 1950, p. 5</ref> but did not revive it in subsequent years; it received a concert performance and broadcast in 1972.<ref>Greenfield, Edward. "The Olympians on Radio 3", ''The Guardian'', 22 February 1972, p. 10</ref>

===Later years===
In 1950, Bliss was [[Knight bachelor|knighted]].<ref name=who/> After the death of [[Arnold Bax|Sir Arnold Bax]] he was appointed [[Master of the Queen's Music]] in 1953, to the relief of Walton, who feared he would be asked to take the post.<ref>Kennedy (1989) p. 170</ref> In ''The Times'', Howes commented, "The duties of a Master of the Queen's Music are what he chooses to make of them, but they include the composition of ceremonial and occasional music".<ref name=times56/> Bliss, who composed quickly and with facility, was able to discharge the many duties of the post, providing music as required for state occasions, from the birth of a child to the Queen, to the funeral of [[Winston Churchill]], to the investiture of the [[Charles, Prince of Wales|Prince of Wales]].<ref name=grove/><ref>Arnold-Forster, Mark. "Birthday Song", ''The Observer'', 21 February 1960, p. 1</ref><ref>Tracey, Edmund. "March of Homage set the stately tone", ''The Observer'', 31 January 1965, p. 4</ref> Howes commended Bliss's ''Processional'' for the 1953 coronation, and ''A Song of Welcome'', Bliss's first official ''pièce d'occasion''.<ref name=times56/>

In 1956, Bliss headed the first delegation by British musicians to the Soviet Union since the end of the Second World War. The party included the violinist [[Alfredo Campoli]], the oboist [[Léon Goossens]], the soprano [[Jennifer Vyvyan]], the conductor [[Clarence Raybould]] and the pianist [[Gerald Moore]].<ref>Bliss, Arthur, "A musical embassy to the USSR – Russia through English eyes", ''The Times'', 1 June 1956, p. 11</ref> Bliss returned to Moscow in 1958, as a member of the jury of the [[International Tchaikovsky Competition]], with fellow jurors including [[Emil Gilels]] and [[Sviatoslav Richter]].<ref>[http://www.tchaikovsky-competition.com/en/history/1958/Jury "The Jury – 1958"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110603093359/http://www.tchaikovsky-competition.com/en/history/1958/Jury|date=3 June 2011}} International Tchaikovsky Competition, accessed 22 March 2011</ref>
[[File:Coventry Cathedral -old and new-5July2008.jpg|thumb|right|[[Coventry Cathedral]] for which Bliss composed ''The Beatitudes'']]
In addition to his official functions, Bliss continued to compose steadily throughout the 1950s. His works from that decade include his Second String Quartet (1950); a scena, ''The Enchantress'' (1951), for the [[contralto]] [[Kathleen Ferrier]]; a Piano Sonata (1952); and a Violin Concerto (1955), for Campoli. The orchestral ''Meditations on a Theme by John Blow'' (1955) was a particularly deep-felt work, and Bliss regarded it highly among his output.<ref name=dnb/> In 1959–60 he collaborated with the librettist [[Christopher Hassall]] on an opera for television, based on the scriptural story of Tobias and the Angel . It won praise for the way in which Bliss and Hassall had understood and adapted to the more intimate medium of television,<ref>"Bliss's New Opera for Television", ''The Times'', 18 May 1960, p. 18</ref> though some critics thought Bliss's music competent but unremarkable.<ref>Heyworth, Peter. "Piedmont in Seville", ''The Observer'', 22 May 1960, p. 22; and Mason, Colin. "Opera on stage and screen." ''The Guardian'', 18 May 1960. p. 7</ref>

In 1961, Bliss and Hassall collaborated on a [[cantata]], ''The Beatitudes'', commissioned for the opening of the new [[Coventry Cathedral]]. Reviews were friendly,<ref>"Sacred music, but in a secular atmosphere", ''The Times'', 26 May 1962, p. 4; and Mason, Colin. "New music at the Coventry Festival", ''The Guardian'', 26 May 1962, p. 5A</ref> but the work has rarely been performed since, and has been eclipsed by another choral work written for Coventry at the same time, [[Benjamin Britten|Britten]]'s ''[[War Requiem]]''.{{refn|At 2011, there had been 11 recordings released of the Britten work;<ref>[https://archive.today/20120802011814/http://www.gramophone.net/Search/Results/Britten+War+Requiem//1/2000-01-01/2009-12-31 "Britten War Requiem"], ''[[Gramophone (magazine)|Gramophone.net]]; accessed 22 March 2011.</ref> the Bliss work had received none.|group= n}} Bliss followed this with two further large-scale choral works, ''Mary of Magdala'' (1962) and ''The Golden Cantata'' (1963).<ref name=grove/>

Throughout his life, Bliss was vigilant on the state of music in Britain, about which he had written extensively since the 1920s.<ref>See for example, Bliss, Arthur. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/765664 "Some Aspects of the Present Musical Situation".] ''Proceedings of the Musical Association, 49th Session (1922–1923)'', pp. 59–77, accessed 23 March 2011 {{subscription required}}; and Bliss, Arthur. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/920199 "Aspects of Contemporary Music"], ''The Musical Times'', May 1934, pp. 401–05; accessed 23 March 2011 {{subscription required}}</ref> In 1969 he publicly censured the BBC for its plan to cut its classical music budget and disband several of its orchestras. He was delegated by his colleagues Walton, Britten, [[Peter Maxwell Davies]] and [[Richard Rodney Bennett]] to make a strong protest to [[William Glock]], the BBC's controller of music.{{refn|Of the six BBC orchestras under threat, three survived, but it is not known whether the composers' protests influenced the outcome.<ref>"Sir Arthur Bliss leads protest on BBC orchestras", ''The Times'', 30 June 1969, p. 3</ref>|group= n}} <!--In the 1970s, he looked to the future of Britain's orchestras by working with the young players of the Leicestershire Schools Symphony Orchestra for some years.{{refn|Bliss conducted the orchestra in his Piano Concerto at the 1970 [[Cheltenham Music Festival]] with Frank Wibaut as soloist, and in the same year recorded his ''Introduction and Allegro'' with the orchestra for the [[Argo Records (UK)|Argo]] label. The relationship with the LSSO continued into 1975 with a new production of his ballet ''The Lady of Shalott'' at the Leicester Haymarket Theatre.|group= n}} CITATIONS LACKING-->

Bliss continued to compose into his eighth and ninth decades, in which his works included the Cello Concerto (1970) for [[Mstislav Rostropovich]], the ''Metamorphic Variations'' for orchestra (1972),<ref name=grove/> and a final cantata, ''Shield of Faith'' (1974), for soprano, baritone, chorus and organ, celebrating 500 years of [[St. George's Chapel, Windsor Castle]], setting poems chosen from each of the five centuries of the chapel's existence.<ref>Howard, Philip. "For England and St George", ''The Times'', 23 April 1975, p. 16</ref>

Bliss died at his London home in 1975 at the age of 83.<ref name=times/> His wife Trudy outlived him by 33 years, dying in 2008 at the age of 104.<ref>{{cite news |title=Lady Bliss |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/3497984/Lady-Bliss.html |access-date=2 August 2021 |work=[[The Daily Telegraph|The Telegraph]] |date=21 November 2008|url-access=subscription}}</ref>