14 The
. Daily Telegraph,
STAR OF AN UNFLAMBOYANT CONDUCTOR'
kg
Saturday, Nov. 19, 1983
SPECIAL OFFER!
RISING
HERE is a certain
image attached to
the profession of
conductor — artistic
looks,
dramatic,
flamboyant, often a trick
temperament -— whi
3,000 ARRAN STYLE
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He is almost aggressively down-to-earth, looks
like a tough TV cop and
has so assiduously cultivated his non-traditional
image that he believes he
has hindered his career
by it.
“ Conductors who
are good self-publicists invariably become betterknown and therefore a
far greater draw for the
public,” he said.
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735 Christchurch Road, Bescombe, Dorset.
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-~
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A
At 53 he has achieved
the greatest accolade in
what is rapidly becoming
a distinguished career —
he has been appointed
“associate conductor of the
London
Philharmonic
Orchestra, and condu
it for the first time
this
week at the Royal Festival
Hall.
_ Another factor he believes has not helped his
career
is
championing
often - neglected British
twentieth - centu
composers, following
the footsteps of his mentor and
idol, Sir Adrian Boult.
Interest is reviving in
one of his favouirtes, Sir
Armold Bax, whose centenary it is this year, and
he was pleased to include
two of Bax’s lesser-known
He wanted to be a musiglhan but ‘fh;ng(]la injury at
the age of
eight sto
that. As he was goo]c)lpeadé
singing
and
harmony
studies, he began to study
~scores. He eventually went
~ to Oxford to study English
ilology but immediately
ecame involved in music
and won a competition to
conduct
~orchestra.
the
university
-.“I had a Httlé previous
‘
experience with the school
choir and in the forces,”
-
-
over two years.
Vernon Handley ., . . down-to-garth and looking
like a TV cop. Picture by KENNETH MASON.
works
cert.
in
‘
Monday’s
flees to his home in the
con-
countryside
of
the
Wye
Valley, where he lives with
his second wife, Victoria,
who is, he said proudly
~ “about half my age,” an
their two young children.
The composer was an
Englishman who took a
passionate interest in Celtic culture, using it for
much of his musical inspiration. Vernon Handley
feels much the same.
Far from spending his
whole life in the cultural
hotspots of Europe, when
he is not conducting he
There he studies and
photographs = wild birds,
grows old roses and makes
furniture, including the
family dining-table and
eight chairs, completed
Al
PR
—
These
“disparate interests are
~ linked to each other, and
to music, by what he describes as “the form and
architecture
of
things
which is to me one o
the
most
fascinating
aspects of life and a fundamental quality of good
music.”
Perhaps one reason for
the unconventional
approach of Vernon Handley
(known
in
the
music
world as Tod, because he
~ orchestras such as Royal
for advice and received
“a standard, off-putting
reply.” Having grabbed
every opportunity to conduct on an amateur basis,
with church and Women’s
Institute choirs over two
Sir
phoned
he
years,
to
asked
and
Adrian
a
of
attend a rehearsal
was:Holst concert. “I
amazed that he remembered me,’ said Vernon,
pool Philharmonic, Hallé
and the LPO, especially
at
Oxford
wrote to Sir Adrian Boult
musical tradition in his
family and he is entirely
self-taught. He never oconsidered
another
career
because, he said, * for as
far back as I can remember, music made me feel
peculiar inside.”
Vernon Handley is the
first to admit he fits in
no way at all.
he
While
“toddles” with his feet
turned in) is his very
ordinary background.
His mother was a piano
teacher but there was no
he said, “but then there
‘were none
of the presentday
competitions
for
young conductors and one
“but he said, ‘Oh, Handley, I thought I had put
you off. Well, we had better have a talk’.”
This was in 1956 and
for some years after that,
said Vernon, “T went to
about 80 per cent. of his
rehearsals and my training consisted of discussing
them with him over coffee afterwards.”
marvellous
The two became friends
—“1 think we sparked
orchestral . each other off and though
us
wers
through.”
muddling
p
After Oxford he took
“any menial piece-work
that allowed me to study
ents,”
scores in quiet
and was also training on
double bass, violin and
trombone, three instruments which, he said
wryly, he can make sound
identical.
for recording.
His belief is that British
conductors necessarily
range
broad
a
have
“ because our home-grown
composers
he usually won our ftussle, he was always very
. genemus,” he said. Boult
rst paid him the compliment of watching him
conduct, as an amateur,
in 1958 and canvassed for
his first professional en-
gagement, with the
Bournemouth Symphony
Orchestra, in 1960.
After that, profeséia{lal
engagements came bhqock
fast, with major
an
are
held in
such low esteem that we
cannot get away with
promoting just them, as
Europeans do with their
national composers.” He
has done much to establish the reputation of
British composers abroad
and always asks to in-
works
such
programmes abroad.
. clude
B By AVRIL .GROOM
ad to start from scratch.
Theve were one or two
- musicians from whom I
learnt a lot but most of
Philharmonic, Royal Liver-
in
His strong
British
c 0 nnections
continue
he is princi-
pal guest conductor of the BB
C Scottish Symphony Orchestra,
will be artistic director of
the 1985 Norwich and Nor-
folk Triennial Festival and
will be musical director of
the Great British Music
Festival, which involves
four Lendon orchestras
playing at the Royal Festival Hall, next year.
He receives more than
100 scores each year from
hopeful young British com-
posers, of which, he said,
“ at least a dozen are very
performing,
worthwhile
but getting the opportunity to do so is anpther
matter. I have to keep
hoping that British music
will be fashionable one
day.”