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Concept
Havergal Brian
Summary
William Havergal Brian (29 January 1876 28 November 1972) was a prominent 20th-century English composer, librettist, and church organist.
He is best known for having composed 32 symphonies, an unusually high number amongst his contemporaries, most of them late in his life. His best-known work is his Symphony No. 1, The Gothic, which calls for some of the largest orchestral forces demanded by a conventionally structured concert work.
He also composed five operas and a number of other orchestral works, as well as songs, choral music and a small amount of chamber music. Brian enjoyed a period of popularity earlier in his career and rediscovery in the 1950s, but public performances of his music have remained rare and he has been described as a cult composer. He continued to be extremely productive late into his career, composing large works even into his nineties, most of which remained unperformed during his lifetime.
William Havergal Brian was born on 29 January 1876 in Dresden, in the Potteries district of Staffordshire, near the Stoke-on-Trent suburb of Longton. He was one of a very small number of composers to originate from the English working class. Brian's middle name Havergal, by which he went beginning at a young age, was named after Frances Ridley Havergal of the prominent Havergal hymn-writing family.
Brian's earliest musical education appears to have been as a choirboy; he sang in the choir at St James' church in Longton. In 1887 he and other choristers from his home town participated in a concert in Lichfield Cathedral marking the Jubilee of Queen Victoria. This experience gave the boy an interest in large-scale musical effects. At the age of 12, after leaving the elementary school attached to the church, he started work (he tried a variety of trades). In his spare time, he continued to study music including the organ for which he showed talent at a young age; as a composer he was virtually self-taught. From 1896 he was organist of All Saints', a Gothic Revival church in Odd Rode, just across the county border in Cheshire.
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