Editing Alan Bush (section)

===1930s: emergent composer===
In March 1931 Bush and Nancy were married in London, before returning to Germany where Bush continued his studies. In April a BBC broadcast performance of his Dance Overture for Military Band, Op. 12a, received a mixed reception. Nancy Bush quotes two listeners' comments that appeared in the ''[[Radio Times]]'' on 8 May 1931. One thought that "such a medley of fearful discords could never be called music",<ref>N. Bush, p. 37</ref> while another opined that "[we] should not cry for more Mozart, Haydn or Beethoven if modern composers would all give us sheer beauty like this".<ref name= NB38>N. Bush, p. 38</ref> 
[[File:Crystal Palace General view from Water Temple.jpg|thumb|left|The Crystal Palace at Sydenham, venue for the 1934 Pageant for Labour]]
At the end of summer 1931 the couple returned permanently to England, and settled in the village of [[Radlett]], in [[Hertfordshire]]. In the following years three daughters were born.<ref name= Craggs1/> Bush resumed his RAM and LLCU duties, and in 1932 accepted a new appointment, as an examiner for the Associated Board of London's Royal Schools of Music, a post which involved extensive overseas travel.<ref name= ODNB/> These new domestic and professional responsibilities limited Bush's composing activity, but he provided the music for the 1934 Pageant of Labour,<ref name= Jones/> organised for the London Trades Council and held at the [[The Crystal Palace|Crystal Palace]] during October.<ref name= Pageant>{{cite web|title= Compositions: Pageant|url= http://www.alanbushtrust.org.uk/music/compositions/PA.asp?room=Music|publisher= The Alan Bush Music Trust|access-date= 14 June 2017}}</ref> Tippett, who co-conducted the event, later described it as a "high water mark" in Bush's drive to provide workers' choirs with settings for left-wing texts.<ref>Tippett 1981, p. 9</ref> In 1936 Bush was one of the founders of the Workers' Musical Association (WMA), and became its first chairman.<ref>Kemp, pp. 33–34</ref>

In 1935 Bush began work on a piano concerto which, completed in 1937, included the unusual feature of a mixed chorus and baritone soloist in the finale, singing a radical text by [[Randall Swingler]]. Bush played the piano part when the work was premiered by the BBC Symphony Orchestra under [[Sir Adrian Boult]] on 4 March 1938. The largely left-wing audience responded to the work enthusiastically;<ref name="Hall, p. 133">Hall, p. 133</ref> Tippett observed that "to counter the radical tendencies of the finale ... Boult forced the applause to end by unexpectedly performing the National Anthem".<ref name= Tippett/> A performance of the concerto a year later, at the 1939 "Festival of Music for the People", drew caustic comments from [[Neville Cardus]] in  ''[[The Manchester Guardian]]''.  Cardus saw little direction and no humour in the music: "Why don't these people laugh at themselves now and then? Just for fun."<ref>{{cite news|last= Cardus|first= Neville|title= Music for the People|newspaper= The Manchester Guardian|date= 6 April 1939|page= 13|id= {{ProQuest|484628062}}}} {{subscription required}}</ref>

Bush provided much of the music, and also acted as general director, for the London Co-operative Societies' pageant "Towards Tomorrow", held at [[Wembley Stadium]] on 2 July 1938.<ref name= Pageant/> In the autumn of that year he visited both the Soviet Union and the United States.<ref name= Craggs18>Craggs, p. 18</ref> Back home in early 1939 he was closely involved in founding and conducting the London String Orchestra, which operated successfully until 1941 and again in the immediate postwar years.<ref>Craggs, p. 17</ref> He also began to write a major orchestral work, his Symphony No. 1 in C.<ref name= Craggs18/><ref name= ABMTOrch>{{cite web|title= Compositions: Orchestral works|url= http://www.alanbushtrust.org.uk/music/compositions/OR.asp?room=Music|publisher= The Alan Bush Music Trust|access-date= 15 June 2017}}</ref> Amid this busy life Bush was elected a [[List of Royal Academy of Music people#Past and present Fellows of the Royal Academy of Music (FRAM)|Fellow of the Royal Academy of Music]].<ref name= OMO/>