John F. Porte’s “Gustav Holst” (Musical Courier, 1923): An Annotated Reprint Part 1

John F. Porte was an early‑20th‑century British musical author best known for his accessible studies of composers and his advocacy for melodious, broadly appealing music. He wrote popular monographs on figures such as Grieg and Tchaikovsky, aiming to introduce general readers to their lives, styles, and aesthetic ideals. Porte’s books often blended biography with clear, enthusiastic commentary, reflecting his belief that music should communicate directly and emotionally. Though not a scholar in the modern academic sense, he played a notable role in shaping public musical taste, helping a wide readership engage with major Romantic composers and their works. This account of Holst was published Musical Courier on 11 October 1923. This was written some twelve years before the composer’s death. Several important works would be written in this period, including Egdon Heath (1927), the Hammersmith: Prelude and Scherzo (1930) and the Brook Green Suite (1933)

The Musical Courier was a famous weekly music magazine published in New York City from 1880 until 1962. It was one of the most widely read music journals in the United States, covering classical performance, industry trade news, and instrument manufacturing.

In this essay, Holst emerges as a modest, hard‑working composer‑teacher whose originality, folk‑inflected directness and independence from academic convention underpin his rise to fame. Porte sketches his personality, teaching at Morley and St Paul’s, his unconventional operas, major orchestral works - especially The Planets - and choral achievements, portraying a modern British composer speaking “big things in plain language.”

A few notes are appended at the end of the essay.

THE RISE TO FAME OF GUSTAV HOLST gives us a human life story of a great composer happening in our midst. For he is here today, this intensely human man, teaching young people music, correcting their exercises at a school situated in a poor part of London, and yet creating music of his own that is now being everywhere acknowledged as undoubtedly the work of an important man.

Holst was born September 21, 1874, at Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, and, like Elgar, is an Englishman of the West country, the Cotswold Hills supplying a similar historical background for his birthplace as did the Malvern Hills for his predecessor, For some years Holst generally appeared in print as Gustav von Holst, but the Great War made the misguiding foreign appearance of his name disconcerting, and by Deed Poll he abbreviated it to Gustav Holst. His 18th century forbears were Swedish.

Academic Background.

Holst studied under Sir Hubert Parry and Sir Charles V. Stanford, a decidedly academic grounding for this leader of modern freedom in music. One can see very little indeed of Stanford's teaching in Holst’s compositions, and his remark to a student that “Charlie,” as Stanford was called by his pupils, [1] likes him, but does not like his music, is not surprising. At Frankfort he met Percy Grainger, Cyril Scott, and others. The spread chords in the pianoforte music of the former he humorously terms “Frankfort harmonies.” [2]

The career of Holst is, as I have indicated, an intensely human story. In his earlier days he played in seaside orchestras, and he has always been hard at work teaching, not in learned academies, but down where grit and the call of art struggle with life existence. His unflagging, almost heroic work in the musical classes at Morley College, situated in Waterloo Road, a squalid quarter of Southeast London, [3] should become historical. I have picked up the current issue of a great London daily newspaper and notice a two-column headline, “Rush to Hear Holst.” The notice refers to a Queens Hall Promenade concert at which Holst conducted four movements of his Planets orchestral suite. [4] The critic remarks that Gustav Holst has created something of a record, for he is a serious British composer who draws the public. Not even Sir Edward Elgar, at the height of his popularity, drew a more numerous or enthusiastic audience.

This same day I saw a poster announcing the autumn reopening of Morley College in the squalid Waterloo Road; Holst will still conduct the music classes there. That is Holst the man.

Another scene of Holst’s activities as a teacher is at St. Paul’s Girls’ School, Brook Green, London, and his St. Paul’s Suite for Strings is a personal memento of his work there.

His Personality.

The personality of Holst is unassuming, unconventional, and affable. As a champion of modern music, he will convince you with his straight to the point remarks, which are extremely characteristic of the man. A friend of mine discussing modern music with Holst ventured to ask him if he thought the moderns were sincere. Holst turned around in a flash. “Sincere? Of course they are sincere!” He then agreed that modern composers have no landmarks to guide them, but are making their own route.

For academic routine he has little to say. “After a few years of study a man may become a Mus. Doc., with any inspiration he may have had knocked out of him.” Music to Holst must natural expression, not confined in a straitjacket of rules and regulations. He discourages composing at the piano, but one of his students at Constantinople, [5] where he conducted the musical selection of the Y. M. C. A, educational scheme for British troops, tried a little effort on the instrument, but hesitated over the suitability of a modulation. “Well, for goodness’ sake, modulate,” Holst told the student, “Don’t play about.”

The appearance of the man does not suggest the bold and big character of much of his music. His expression is almost cherubic, especially when he beams at you through his glasses, but in one way the music is synonymous with its creator. It speaks straight out with a modest assurance that few can fail to understand, and with it there goes a certain quiet pride and dignity that commands interest. This is certainly an expression of the character of Holst, if it does not suggest that rather short, thick set, fair man with a high forehead and glasses, to be seen proceeding hurriedly, but firmly along the Waterloo Road, London. I saw him quite recently at a Queens Hall Promenade Concert listening to some contemporary British music. He stood with that half-puzzled, half-shy expression of his, looking like a learned librarian disturbed among his books. Nearby stood a man who ought to have been a famous composer, for he smoked Russian cigarettes, had long hair, loose clothes, and a wild artistic expression!

Notes

[1] It is unlikely that anyone referred to Sir Charles Villiers Stanford as “Charlie” to his face.

[2] The Frankfurt Group comprised of Balfour Gardiner, Norman O’Neill, Cyril Scott, Roger Quilter and Percy Grainger, then young composers who studied with the German composer and music teacher Iwan Knorr during the 1890s. United by friendship and a rebellious, anti‑establishment streak, they resisted English musical nationalism and favoured Delius’s harmonic sensuality over Beethovenian architecture.

[3] In the early 1920s Morley College operated out of the Royal Victoria Hall (the Old Vic) at 131-137 Waterloo Road, London. In 1924 it moved to new premises at 61 Westminster Bridge Road, where it remains to this day. It is certainly not “squalid” in 2026. The area around the Old Vic has vibrant restaurants, pubs, and cafes.

[4] The “Rush to Hear Holst” was the headline of a column in the Daily Express (4 September 1923, p.10) where it was noted that at a performance of The Planets, Gustav Holst had “created something of a record: he is a serious composer who “draws.” This occurred during the Promenade Concert on 28 August 1923, where The New Queen’s Hall Orchestra under Sir Henry Wood played four movements of the work: Mars, Venus, Mercury, and Jupiter.

[5] Holst was in Constantinople at the end of the First World War because he had been appointed a Y.M.C.A. musical organiser for British troops in the Eastern Mediterranean, teaching music and directing soldier ensembles in Salonika and later Constantinople. His letters describe giving concerts for demobilising forces and organising musical life amid difficult conditions.

To be continued...