Introducing Walter Leigh (1905-1942)

Walter Leigh is one of several composers who were killed fighting for their country during the Second World War. Others included the Austrian Viktor Ullmann (1898-1944) who died in Auschwitz, the Frenchman Jehan Alain (1911-1940) and British Michael Heming (1920-42).  All were accomplished musicians or at least showed considerable promise. 

Hubert Foss, (Musical Times, August 1942, p.255) summed up Leigh’s achievement: “This is a grave loss to British music. Walter Leigh was a composer through and through: a serious composer, especially when writing his light music. Composing music was for him a professional man's job, not an aesthetic's languorings or expressionisms. He tackled the job with his own special simplicity of mind and wisdom.”

The present-day listener will find Walter Leigh’s music approachable and often engaging. Whether it is the sub-Elgarian Overture: Agincourt, the abstract Viola Sonata heard at the 1932 Vienna I.S.CM. Festival or the Sullivan-esque operetta Jolly Roger, he is never patronising, deliberately obscure or difficult.

After a brief overview of Leigh’s career, Hubert Foss concludes “Leigh was one of the most charming musicians I have ever met, so absolutely sane and practical and without a single affectation. In losing him in battle, this country has not only lost a fine and lovable man, and a fine composer, but also an idea of music which it can ill afford to lose.”

Brief Biography of Walter Leigh

• Walter Leigh was born on 22 June 1905 in Wimbledon, London
• His earliest musical lessons were from his mother - who was a Prussian pianist - and with Dr Harold Darke. 
• He was educated at University College School, Hampstead.
• In 1922 Leigh won an organ scholarship to Christ’s College, Cambridge.
• He studied at Christ’s College, Cambridge University (1922–1925) with Edward Joseph Dent and Cyril Rootham.
• Between 1927 -1929 he studied with Paul Hindemith in the Hochschule für Musik in Berlin.
• Leigh’s first published work, Three Pieces for Amateur Orchestra, dates from this period.
• In 1930 Leigh declined a teaching job and began to accept commissions from a variety of sources and developed an interest in the theatre.
• From 1931 to 1932 he was Musical Director of the Festival Theatre, Cambridge.
• Two important light operas were composed The Pride of the Regiment (1932) and Jolly Roger (1933)
• In 1934, Leigh composed the score for Basil Wright’s film The Song of Ceylon for the Ceylon Tea Board.
• His most popular concert work, the Concertino for harpsichord and strings appeared in 1936.
• In partnership with Herbert Farjeon, he produced music for the review Nine Sharp (1939) at the Little Theatre and In Town Again at the Criterion in 1940.
• During 1941, Leigh joined the army in World War II serving with Royal Armoured Corps, 4th Queen's Own Hussars.
• Walter Leigh died in action during the Siege of Tobruk, Libya on the 12 June 1942.

Six Essential Works

I have selected six compositions by Walter Leigh. The criteria is that they are currently available on CD, Download or YouTube. In fact, a large proportion of Leigh’s orchestral, chamber, and piano music has been recorded. The operetta Jolly Roger has also been issued in disc.

• Sonatina for Viola and Piano (1930)
• Music for String Orchestra (1931-32)
• Music for Three Pianos (1932)
• Concertino for Harpsichord or Piano and String Orchestra (1934)
• Agincourt Overture (1935)
• A Midsummer Night's Dream - Suite for Small Orchestra (1936) 

Bibliography

Basic information about Walter Leigh can be found in the various editions of Grove’s Dictionary of Music and Musicians, as well as other reference books, Wikipedia, obituaries and CD liner notes. Fortunately, there is also an entry in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Sadly, there is no biography or musical study dedicated to the composer. Entry level would include a remarkable pen portrait of Leigh written by Roger Wimbush and published in the Monthly Musical Record (June 1938, p.138ff). Two major ‘recent’ essays include David Drew’s “North Sea Crossings. Walter Leigh, Hindemith and English Music” (2008) in Tempo April 2010, pp.44-64) and Thomas Irvine’s “Hindemith’s Disciple in London: Walter Leigh on Modern Music”, in British Music and Modernism, 1895–1960, (ed. Matthew Riley, Routledge, London, 2010)

If you can only hear one CD

In 1985, Lyrita records issued and LP of Walter Leigh’s music (SRCS126). It included the Concertino for Harpsichord and String Orchestra, Music for String Orchestra, A Midsummer Night's Dream - Suite and some incidental music from The Frogs (1936). The London Philharmonic Orchestra was conducted by Nicholas Braithwaite and the harpsichord was played by Trevor Pinnock. In 2014 this was rereleased on CD (SRCD.289) and included the Overture: Agincourt and the Jolly Roger Overture. Thus, most of Leigh’s orchestral works are available to the listener.

Of further interest is the Dutton Epoch disc (CDLX 7143) which features virtually all of Walter Leigh’s chamber music. There is a Lyrita CD of the comic opera Jolly Roger (REAM 2116) and the hard-to-find Walter Leigh: Piano Music and Songs played by Peter Hewitt (and others) on Tremula REM 101-2, published 1992.

Finally, if you wish to hear just one work

It must be the Concertino for Harpsichord and String Orchestra. Hugo Cole has written that it “is one of a number of chamber works of the period [by Leigh]: an elegant and concise work, more French than German in its spare-notes neo-classicism, the keyboard writing showing signs of [Maurice] Ravel’s influence.” It is written in three movements: Allegro, Andante and Allegro Vivace. The work was premiered by Elizabeth Poston in 1934. It is sometimes performed with the harpsichord replaced by piano.

Walter Leigh: Jolly Roger

My introduction to Walter Leigh was the overture to the present ‘burlesque.’ It was included on a wonderful LP of ‘More Lyrita Lollipops’ (SRCS. 99) released in 1979. This album also included music by Hamilton Harty, William Alwyn, Michael Balfe, Arnold Bax and Elgar. I still have my vinyl copy of the release.  In 1985 an album dedicated to Leigh’s music was issued by Lyrita (SRCS.126) – this included the Concertino for harpsichord and string orchestra, Music for string orchestra, A Midsummer Night’s Dream Suite and the Overture and Dance from the incidental music to Aristophanes’ The Frogs. Fortunately, all the above named works have been re-released on CD. There was another disc produced in 1995 of Leigh’s piano music and songs. I guess that if you blinked, you would have missed it: it is now deleted. In 2005 Dutton Epoch issued a fine conspectus of the composer’s ‘complete’ chamber music, now available as a download.

Before any of this industry occurred the BBC had produced a broadcast of Walter Leigh’s Jolly Roger or ‘The Admiral’s Daughter’. It went on the air on 21 December 1972.  Glancing at the BBC Radio Times shows that the burlesque had actually been broadcast in various incarnations over the years, including ‘selected scenes’ on the nascent television network (using the Baird Process) as early as 1933.

It is not the place to analyse Walter Leigh’s music. However it is important to note that there were two sides to his musical character – his ‘art’ or ‘serious’ music and his attraction towards writing for the stage, film, radio.  At the time of his death in 1942 The Times could report that the general public will best recall him for his ‘intimate revues’ and his two operas –The Pride of the Regiment and the present Jolly Roger. Another major achievement was his score for The Song of Ceylon, which received an award for ‘best film’ at the 1935 International Film Festival in Brussels.

Leigh suffers from the lack of a detailed biography: any understanding of the composer’s life, works and standing have to be pieced together from a variety of sources. It is to be hoped that a biography will be forthcoming.

The first thing to remind the listener of is that burlesque’s title Jolly Roger relates to a person, not a flag, as some enthusiasts of Treasure Island and other piratical endeavours would intuit.  The action is set in Jamaica in the year of our Lord 1690. Nevertheless, the tale does include all the traditional apparatus of pirate stories, including the skull and crossbones, buccaneers and rum.

The three acts are set on the private landing stage of Government House, aboard the pirate ship and the terrace of Government House, respectively.  The plot involves the evil Sir Roderick Venom who was Governor of Jamaica, and was party to piratical activities in his jurisdiction. He causes an innocent planter, Jolly Roger, to be arrested, accused of piracy and sentenced to a flogging. Fortunately, his plans are disrupted by the arrival of Admiral Sir William Rowlocks and his beautiful daughter Amelia. Along with their companions they resolve to rid the Jamaica of the wicked pirates. Predictably, the love interest if amply satisfied by the ultimate marriage of Roger and Amelia.

The libretto was by Scobie Mackenzie and V.C. Clinton-Baddeley (1900-70). The first performance was on 13 February 1933 at the Opera House in Manchester and it subsequently played at the Savoy Theatre in the West End.

Musically, Jolly Roger could be described as Sir Arthur Sullivan meets Paul Hindemith. This is not a perverse as it may at first seem. What Walter Leigh has achieved is the combination of Sullivan’s sparkle, wit and charm with his own ‘creative gift’ derived from study with the German composer. Certainly, the score is well-contrived, distinctive and has ‘a deftness and allure’ denied many then contemporary works in the same genre.  Paul Conway notes the similarity between Leigh and Richard Rodney Bennett as composers who could approach film and light music with ‘the same seriousness…they brought to their concert works.’

The liner notes are highly detailed. After the usual track, cast and character listings, there is a good synopsis of the three acts. Paul Conway has provided an excellent essay on the composer, his works and the genesis and reception of Jolly Roger.

I enjoyed this performance immensely- it is such fun. Two questions suggest themselves to me. Is Jolly Roger worth reviving as a stage production in 2015? I am not convinced: it is very much a work of its time, in spite of the undisputable quality of its music. Even the present recording is somewhat ephemeral: listen for the realistic seagull sounds!

On the other hand, I would recommend this CD to all enthusiasts of light opera.  As the contemporary Play Pictorial put it, ‘Mr Leigh’s music [is] tuneful and scholarly… [and] has caught something of Sullivan’s spirit and mingled it with his own creative gift…’ It is this that makes Jolly Roger such a success and deserves our attention more than 80 years after its premiere.

Walter LEIGH (1905-1942) Jolly Roger (or the Admiral’s Daughter: A New Musical Burlesque (1933)

Sir Roderick Venom (tenor) Neilson Taylor; Sir William Rowlocks (tenor) Alan Dudley; Jolly Roger (tenor) Vernon Midgely; Bold Ben Blister (Bass) Leslie Fyson; The Bloody Pirate (baritone) Gordon Faith; Amelia (soprano) Marietta Midgley; Miss Flora Pott (mezzo soprano) Helen Landis; Prudence Wary (contralto) Patricia Whitmore

The Ambrosian Singers, BBC Concert Orchestra/Ashley Lawrence

LYRITA REAM 2116 (MONO)

With thanks to MusicWeb International where this review was first published.