Charles Wilfred Orr
Encyclopedia
Charles Wilfred Leslie Orr, generally known as C. W. Orr (31 July 1893 - 24 February 1976), was an English
composer
.
shortly after the death of his father (a captain in the Indian Army
) from tuberculosis
, he learnt the piano and studied music theory
as a child. He was attracted to the singing of Elena Gerhardt
, who he heard sing in London. He developed an interest in lieder, especially that of Johannes Brahms
, Franz Schubert
, Robert Schumann
, and after reading Ernest Newman
's book on the composer, Hugo Wolf
, and determined to become a songwriter
, which he pursued by studying at the Guildhall School of Music. He was attracted to the music of Frederick Delius
after approaching him at a London
restaurant
in 1915, who became his mentor
and helped him with his early compositions. He also came to know Peter Warlock
, who aided him in publishing his early songs.
He married
in 1929 and moved to Painswick
, Gloucestershire
where he would remain for the rest of his life, to get away from the busy atmosphere of London, which was detrimental to his health; a vaccination
as a child had left him with eczema
, and he contracted tuberculosis
as an adult.
His work as a composer was dominated by the composition of song
s accompanied by piano
; his life's study was the expressive setting of poetry
to music. He wrote more settings of A.E. Housman's poetry than any other composer; he was a particular admirer of Housman, whose poetry he got to know just after World War I
, during which time he was unable to fight on medical grounds, having joined up. He went on research visits to Shropshire
, taking photograph
s, and attended one of Housman's lectures as Kennedy Professor of Latin
at Cambridge University. He asked for permission to translate A Shropshire Lad
into German
so he could bring his songs into wider circulation, but the request was refused.
His piano accompaniments and postludes are an integral part of each song, providing more than bare harmony
; examples of its use for programme music include fluttering semiquavers depicting aspen
leave
s in Along the Field and heavy chord
s in a march to the scaffold in The Carpenter’s Son. His harmonic
language is a mixture of English modality and late Romanticism
. He is regarded as one of Britain’s finest 20th century songwriters.
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
composer
Composer
A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
.
Biography
Born in CheltenhamCheltenham
Cheltenham , also known as Cheltenham Spa, is a large spa town and borough in Gloucestershire, on the edge of the Cotswolds in the South-West region of England. It is the home of the flagship race of British steeplechase horse racing, the Gold Cup, the main event of the Cheltenham Festival held...
shortly after the death of his father (a captain in the Indian Army
Indian Army
The Indian Army is the land based branch and the largest component of the Indian Armed Forces. With about 1,100,000 soldiers in active service and about 1,150,000 reserve troops, the Indian Army is the world's largest standing volunteer army...
) from tuberculosis
Tuberculosis
Tuberculosis, MTB, or TB is a common, and in many cases lethal, infectious disease caused by various strains of mycobacteria, usually Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Tuberculosis usually attacks the lungs but can also affect other parts of the body...
, he learnt the piano and studied music theory
Music theory
Music theory is the study of how music works. It examines the language and notation of music. It seeks to identify patterns and structures in composers' techniques across or within genres, styles, or historical periods...
as a child. He was attracted to the singing of Elena Gerhardt
Elena Gerhardt
Elena Gerhardt was a German mezzo-soprano singer associated with the singing of German classical lieder, of which she was considered one of the great interpreters...
, who he heard sing in London. He developed an interest in lieder, especially that of Johannes Brahms
Johannes Brahms
Johannes Brahms was a German composer and pianist, and one of the leading musicians of the Romantic period. Born in Hamburg, Brahms spent much of his professional life in Vienna, Austria, where he was a leader of the musical scene...
, Franz Schubert
Franz Schubert
Franz Peter Schubert was an Austrian composer.Although he died at an early age, Schubert was tremendously prolific. He wrote some 600 Lieder, nine symphonies , liturgical music, operas, some incidental music, and a large body of chamber and solo piano music...
, Robert Schumann
Robert Schumann
Robert Schumann, sometimes known as Robert Alexander Schumann, was a German composer, aesthete and influential music critic. He is regarded as one of the greatest and most representative composers of the Romantic era....
, and after reading Ernest Newman
Ernest Newman
Ernest Newman was an English music critic and musicologist. Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians describes him as "the most celebrated British music critic in the first half of the 20th century." His style of criticism, aiming at intellectual objectivity in contrast to the more subjective...
's book on the composer, Hugo Wolf
Hugo Wolf
Hugo Wolf was an Austrian composer of Slovene origin, particularly noted for his art songs, or lieder. He brought to this form a concentrated expressive intensity which was unique in late Romantic music, somewhat related to that of the Second Viennese School in concision but utterly unrelated in...
, and determined to become a songwriter
Songwriter
A songwriter is an individual who writes both the lyrics and music to a song. Someone who solely writes lyrics may be called a lyricist, and someone who only writes music may be called a composer...
, which he pursued by studying at the Guildhall School of Music. He was attracted to the music of Frederick Delius
Frederick Delius
Frederick Theodore Albert Delius, CH was an English composer. Born in the north of England to a prosperous mercantile family of German extraction, he resisted attempts to recruit him to commerce...
after approaching him at a London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
restaurant
Restaurant
A restaurant is an establishment which prepares and serves food and drink to customers in return for money. Meals are generally served and eaten on premises, but many restaurants also offer take-out and food delivery services...
in 1915, who became his mentor
Mentor
In Greek mythology, Mentor was the son of Alcimus or Anchialus. In his old age Mentor was a friend of Odysseus who placed Mentor and Odysseus' foster-brother Eumaeus in charge of his son Telemachus, and of Odysseus' palace, when Odysseus left for the Trojan War.When Athena visited Telemachus she...
and helped him with his early compositions. He also came to know Peter Warlock
Peter Warlock
Peter Warlock was a pseudonym of Philip Arnold Heseltine , an Anglo-Welsh composer and music critic. He used the pseudonym when composing, and is now better known by this name....
, who aided him in publishing his early songs.
Marriage
Marriage is a social union or legal contract between people that creates kinship. It is an institution in which interpersonal relationships, usually intimate and sexual, are acknowledged in a variety of ways, depending on the culture or subculture in which it is found...
in 1929 and moved to Painswick
Painswick
Painswick is a small town in Gloucestershire, England. Originally the town grew on the wool trade, but it is now best known for its parish church's yew trees and the local Rococo Garden. The town is mainly constructed of locally quarried Cotswold stone...
, Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire is a county in South West England. The county comprises part of the Cotswold Hills, part of the flat fertile valley of the River Severn, and the entire Forest of Dean....
where he would remain for the rest of his life, to get away from the busy atmosphere of London, which was detrimental to his health; a vaccination
Vaccination
Vaccination is the administration of antigenic material to stimulate the immune system of an individual to develop adaptive immunity to a disease. Vaccines can prevent or ameliorate the effects of infection by many pathogens...
as a child had left him with eczema
Eczema
Eczema is a form of dermatitis, or inflammation of the epidermis . In England, an estimated 5.7 million or about one in every nine people have been diagnosed with the disease by a clinician at some point in their lives.The term eczema is broadly applied to a range of persistent skin conditions...
, and he contracted tuberculosis
Tuberculosis
Tuberculosis, MTB, or TB is a common, and in many cases lethal, infectious disease caused by various strains of mycobacteria, usually Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Tuberculosis usually attacks the lungs but can also affect other parts of the body...
as an adult.
His work as a composer was dominated by the composition of song
Song
In music, a song is a composition for voice or voices, performed by singing.A song may be accompanied by musical instruments, or it may be unaccompanied, as in the case of a cappella songs...
s accompanied by piano
Piano
The piano is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It is one of the most popular instruments in the world. Widely used in classical and jazz music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...
; his life's study was the expressive setting of poetry
Poetry
Poetry is a form of literary art in which language is used for its aesthetic and evocative qualities in addition to, or in lieu of, its apparent meaning...
to music. He wrote more settings of A.E. Housman's poetry than any other composer; he was a particular admirer of Housman, whose poetry he got to know just after World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
, during which time he was unable to fight on medical grounds, having joined up. He went on research visits to Shropshire
Shropshire
Shropshire is a county in the West Midlands region of England. For Eurostat purposes, the county is a NUTS 3 region and is one of four counties or unitary districts that comprise the "Shropshire and Staffordshire" NUTS 2 region. It borders Wales to the west...
, taking photograph
Photograph
A photograph is an image created by light falling on a light-sensitive surface, usually photographic film or an electronic imager such as a CCD or a CMOS chip. Most photographs are created using a camera, which uses a lens to focus the scene's visible wavelengths of light into a reproduction of...
s, and attended one of Housman's lectures as Kennedy Professor of Latin
Kennedy Professor of Latin
The Kennedy Professorship of Latin is the senior professorship of Latin at the University of Cambridge.In 1865, when Benjamin Hall Kennedy retired as headmaster of Shrewsbury School, his friends and former pupils created a fund with the intention of founding a chair in Latin to be named after him...
at Cambridge University. He asked for permission to translate A Shropshire Lad
A Shropshire Lad
A Shropshire Lad is a cycle of sixty-three poems by the English poet Alfred Edward Housman . Some of the better-known poems in the book are "To an Athlete Dying Young", "Loveliest of Trees, the Cherry Now" and "When I Was One-and-Twenty".The collection was published in 1896...
into German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
so he could bring his songs into wider circulation, but the request was refused.
His piano accompaniments and postludes are an integral part of each song, providing more than bare harmony
Harmony
In music, harmony is the use of simultaneous pitches , or chords. The study of harmony involves chords and their construction and chord progressions and the principles of connection that govern them. Harmony is often said to refer to the "vertical" aspect of music, as distinguished from melodic...
; examples of its use for programme music include fluttering semiquavers depicting aspen
Aspen
Populus section Populus, of the Populus genus, includes the aspen trees and the white poplar Populus alba. The five typical aspens are all native to cold regions with cool summers, in the north of the Northern Hemisphere, extending south at high altitudes in the mountains. The White Poplar, by...
leave
Leaf
A leaf is an organ of a vascular plant, as defined in botanical terms, and in particular in plant morphology. Foliage is a mass noun that refers to leaves as a feature of plants....
s in Along the Field and heavy chord
Chord (music)
A chord in music is any harmonic set of two–three or more notes that is heard as if sounding simultaneously. These need not actually be played together: arpeggios and broken chords may for many practical and theoretical purposes be understood as chords...
s in a march to the scaffold in The Carpenter’s Son. His harmonic
Harmony
In music, harmony is the use of simultaneous pitches , or chords. The study of harmony involves chords and their construction and chord progressions and the principles of connection that govern them. Harmony is often said to refer to the "vertical" aspect of music, as distinguished from melodic...
language is a mixture of English modality and late Romanticism
Romantic music
Romantic music or music in the Romantic Period is a musicological and artistic term referring to a particular period, theory, compositional practice, and canon in Western music history, from 1810 to 1900....
. He is regarded as one of Britain’s finest 20th century songwriters.
Songs
For solo voice and piano.- Plucking the Rushes (1921)
- Silent Noon (1921)
- The Earl of Bristol’s Farewell (1927)
- Tryste Noel (1927)
- When as I Wake (1928)
- Hymn before Sleep (1953)
- While Summer On is Stealing (1953)
- 4 Songs (1959): Bahnhofstrasse (1932), Requiem (1954), The Time of Roses (1955), Since Thou, O Fondest and Truest (1957)
Housman settings
- When the Lad for Longing Sighs (1921)
- 2 Songs from A Shropshire LadA Shropshire LadA Shropshire Lad is a cycle of sixty-three poems by the English poet Alfred Edward Housman . Some of the better-known poems in the book are "To an Athlete Dying Young", "Loveliest of Trees, the Cherry Now" and "When I Was One-and-Twenty".The collection was published in 1896...
: Tis Time I Think by Wenlock Town, Loveliest of Trees, The Cherry (1921–1922) - The Carpenter’s Son (1922)
- When I was One-and-Twenty (1924)
- With rue my heart is laden (1924)
- Is my team ploughing (1925)
- On your Midnight Pallet Lying (1925)
- O When I Was in Love with You (1926)
- This Time of Year (1926)
- Soldier from the Wars Returning (1928)
- 7 Songs from A Shropshire Lad (1934): Along the Field (1927), When I Watch the Living Meet (1930), The Lent Lily, Farewell to barn and stack and tree (1928), O fair enough are sky and plain (1931), Hughley Steeple (1930), When Smoke Stood Up from Ludlow (1929)
- The Lads in their Hundreds (1936)
- 3 Songs from A Shropshire Lad (1940): Into My Heart an Air that Kills (1935), Westward on the High-Hilled Plains (1927), O see how thick the goldcup flowers, (1939)
- The Isle of Portland (1938)
- In Valleys Green and Still (1952)
Choral music
- The Brewer’s Man, bass and two-part choirChoirA choir, chorale or chorus is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform.A body of singers who perform together as a group is called a choir or chorus...
(1927) - Slumber Song, choir and piano (1937)
- Fain would I change that note, three-part choir and piano (1937)
Instrumental music
- CotswoldCotswoldThe Cotswolds are a range of hills in central England that give their name to:*Cotswold *Cotswold *Cotswold Chase, a horse race*Cotswold Games, annual games in Chipping Campden, Gloucestershire...
Hill-Tune, string orchestra, (1937) - Midsummer Dance, celloCelloThe cello is a bowed string instrument with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is a member of the violin family of musical instruments, which also includes the violin, viola, and double bass. Old forms of the instrument in the Baroque era are baryton and viol .A person who plays a cello is...
and piano (1957)
Songs (complete)
- The complete CW Orr songbook - volume 1; Stone RecordsStone RecordsStone Records is a British, independent, classical record label, founded in 2008 by opera singer Mark Stone. It started by producing recordings of English song but has since widened its repertoire to include instrumental, choral and orchestral works....
- The complete CW Orr songbook - volume 2; Stone RecordsStone RecordsStone Records is a British, independent, classical record label, founded in 2008 by opera singer Mark Stone. It started by producing recordings of English song but has since widened its repertoire to include instrumental, choral and orchestral works....
Songs (extracts)
- A E Housman: A Shropshire LadA Shropshire LadA Shropshire Lad is a cycle of sixty-three poems by the English poet Alfred Edward Housman . Some of the better-known poems in the book are "To an Athlete Dying Young", "Loveliest of Trees, the Cherry Now" and "When I Was One-and-Twenty".The collection was published in 1896...
, Complete in verse and song; Hyperion RecordsHyperion RecordsHyperion Records is an independent British classical record label.-History:The company was named after Hyperion, one of the Titans of Greek mythology. It was founded by George Edward Perry, widely known as "Ted", in 1980. Early LP releases included rarely recorded 20th century British music by...
CDA66471/2
Further reading
- J. Wilson: C.W. Orr: the Unknown Song-Writer (London, 1989)
- S. Northcote: The Songs of C.W. Orr; in Music & Letters XVIII (1937)
- I. A. Copley: An English Songwriter: C.W. Orr; in Composer no.29 (1968)
- C. Palmer: C.W. Orr: an 80th Birthday Tribute; in Musical Times CXIV (1973)
- C. Palmer: In Memoriam C.W. Orr; in Delius Society Journal no.55 (1977)
Sources
- Jane Wilson: 'Orr, C(harles) W(ilfred)', Grove Music Online ed. L. Macy (Accessed 2007-06-07), http://www.grovemusic.com/
- Andrew Green: notes to A E Housman: A Shropshire LadA Shropshire LadA Shropshire Lad is a cycle of sixty-three poems by the English poet Alfred Edward Housman . Some of the better-known poems in the book are "To an Athlete Dying Young", "Loveliest of Trees, the Cherry Now" and "When I Was One-and-Twenty".The collection was published in 1896...
, Complete in verse and song; Hyperion RecordsHyperion RecordsHyperion Records is an independent British classical record label.-History:The company was named after Hyperion, one of the Titans of Greek mythology. It was founded by George Edward Perry, widely known as "Ted", in 1980. Early LP releases included rarely recorded 20th century British music by...
CDA66471/2