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After studying at the college for 6 years he taught
for a while at a school in the Isle of Man
before returning as a professor of the Academy in 1837. He resigned from the
post 10 years later when criticized for teaching Alfred Day’s theory of
harmony, then openly condemned by other professorial colleagues. Macfarren was
instrumental in helping found the Society of British Musicians in 1834, and
later the Handel Society in 1844. However, his first love was opera and after
three abortive attempts, he wrote The
Devil’s Opera (1838), a work well thought of in its day,
which he followed up with Don
Quixote, which,
was not performed until 1846 because
of a lack of opportunity caused
by poor theatre management and bankruptcy, factors
which cause the abandonment of several
of his operas.
One of his successes,
however, was King Charles II,
presented at the Princess’s Theatre in 1849, with Edward Loder conducting. Unusually,
for the time, it was
almost completely through-composed. The
review in The Times by his friend
J.W. Davison, stated ‘Perhaps, of all our native musicians, Mr Macfarren is
the one who has most highly and variously distinguished himself’.
In
the early 1860's, Macfarren
wrote a string of operas, the best remembered of which was Robin Hood (1860), which played for two seasons
and later had a modest success on the touring circuit. To
many, Robin Hood was a milestone in
the development of a recognized English idiom that depicted rustic charm, just
as German's Merrie England would 50 years later. In the work, the
soloists are musically wedded to their strengths of character and a part song
echoes the old English glee. The Grove Dictionary of Music notes that
‘Macfarren’s handling of the orchestra is bright, uncluttered and masculine;
his brass writing is notably good, being less garish than Wallace's and more
confident than Sullivan’s'. Macfarren followed Robin Hood with She
Stoops to Conquer and Helvellyn and two
comic chamber operas, Jessy Lea and The
Soldier's Legacy, which almost certainly influenced
Sullivan in his later partnership with Gilbert.
Macfarren never matched the fame
bestowed on Balfe, Wallace, or Benedict because he lacked their talent for easy
melody. Always afflicted with poor eyesight, by 1860, he
had become too blind to write his compositions and
had to use an amanuensis but it never
dampened his enthusiasm for composition. In later years, his cantatas and
oratorios became popular with provincial festivals, such as Leeds, Norwich and Birmingham. In 1875 he succeeded Sterndale Bennett
as professor of music at Cambridge and as principal of the RAM. Up to the end of his life, he continued to
write, lecture and compose. He was knighted in 1883 on the same day as Arthur
Sullivan and George Grove.
Opera Recordings
There
are no existing recordings of Macfarren's operas,
either commercial or private. However, Victorian
Opera Northwest have recorded it and it should be
available in 2011.
Other works
Symphonies
nos. 4 & 7, Queensland Symphony Orchestra, Werner A.
Albert. CPO 999
433-2, 1998.
Chevy
Chase overture on Victorian
Concert Overtures, English
Northern
Philharmonia,
David Lloyd-Jones, Hyperion
CDH 55088, 2002.
Two
of his songs, "The Widow Bird" and
"Pack Clouds Away" and his variations
for clarinet, "Traditions of Shakespeare",
can be found on The Victorian Clarinet Tradition,
Colin Bradbury, Oliver Davies, Elaine Barry, Clarinet
Classics CC0022, 1998. CD and the latter on British
Music Society. Sixty Glorious Years. Concert organised by the B.M.S., BMS 422.
One
of his partsongs, "When daisies pied",
can be found
on The Long Day Closes – English Romantic Partsongs.
Canzonetta, Jeffrey Wynn-Davies,
SOMM 204, 2005 and "Orpheus with his
lute" on O MUSICA: Madrigale
& Volkslieder, Dresdner
Kreuzchor, Roderich
Kreile, DG
000289 459 6122, 2001.
Five
of his six string quartets are available
for download from http://imslp.org/index.php?title=Category:Macfarren,_George_Alexander&intersect=Recordings
The
only biography of Macfarren is that
by Henry C. Banister, George
Alexander Macfarren: his life, works
and influence, London: George
Bell and Sons, 1891. Available
online at http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924022235091.
Two
long articles have been published
in the journals of the British
Music Society: Maxwell
W. Pettit, "Sir George Macfarren; the Compleat Victorian", The Journal
of the British Music Society, Volume 8, 1986 and Russell Burdekin,
"Sir George Alexander Macfarren,
his life and his operas", The Journal
of the British Music Society, Volume 32, 2010. See http://www.britishmusicsociety.com/pages/publications.html
A
chapter on Macfarren may be found in George Biddlecombe's English opera from 1834 to 1864 with
particular reference to the works of Michael
Balfe, New York: Garland
Publishing, 1994. He is also the main subject of the chapter "Musical Nationalism
in English Romantic Opera" in
the The Lost Chord:
Essays on Victorian Music, edited by Nicholas Temperley, Bloomington
and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1989.
More
generally, The
Romantic Age 1800-1914, edited
by Nicholas Temperley, London: Athlone Press, 1981, reissued as The Blackwell History of Music in Britain, Vol.5,
Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1988 includes a chapter by Michael Hurd
on "Opera: 1830-1865".
© Victorian Opera
Northwest, 2005 - 2011.
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