Heddle Nash
Encyclopedia
William Heddle Nash was an English lyric tenor
who appeared in opera
and oratorio
in the middle decades of the twentieth century. He also made numerous recordings that are still available on CD reissues.
Nash's voice was of the light tenor class known as "tenore di grazia
". The critic J. B. Steane referred to him as "the English lyric tenor par excellence, without equal then or now." He appeared in tenor roles in operas by Mozart
, Verdi
, Wagner
and Puccini
among others, at the Royal Opera House
, and the Glyndebourne Festival
. His operatic career lasted from 1924 to 1958.
As a concert singer, Nash was known for his performances in oratorio, and in particular in the title role of Elgar
's The Dream of Gerontius
, making the first gramophone recording of the work, in 1945.
district of Deptford
on 14 June 1894, the son of William Nash, master builder, and his wife, Harriet Emma née Carr. The family was musical, and listening at home to a gramophone record by Caruso prompted Nash to apply for a scholarship at the Blackheath Conservatoire of Music
. He was accepted, but a week later World War I broke out. Nash joined the army, serving in France, Salonika, Egypt and Palestine.
The Blackheath scholarship was held open until after the war; Nash took it up on his return. He had some experience of concert and oratorio work, and then he accepted an offer to sing with Podrecca and Feodora's Italian Marionettes. Unseen, standing in the orchestra pit of the Scala
and Coliseum
theatres, he sang the tenor roles in many Italian operas while on the stages the puppets mimed the action. After the London season, the marionette company secured a contract to appear in New York; Nash went with them. On his return to London a friend advanced the money for him to study in Milan with Giuseppe Borgatti
. On 7 April 1923 Nash married Florence Emily Violet Pearce, daughter of a sign manufacturer. They had two sons, one of whom became an operatic baritone.
While studying with Borgatti, Nash made his operatic debut in 1924 at the Teatro Carcano in Milan, when he replaced an indisposed tenor in the role of Almaviva in Rossini's Il barbiere di Siviglia
. It was a notable success. After singing at Turin, Bologna and Genoa, Nash returned to England with his wife in 1925. He had developed an Italianate style of singing that remained with him: it was said of him that he sang everything as though it were by Verdi.
Company under Lilian Baylis
to sing tenor roles in English. His first part for the company was the Duke in Rigoletto
. His success was instantaneous. The Musical Times
said that it was a pleasure to welcome a very beautiful tenor voice, praised his clarity of diction, and predicted that Nash would be one of the eminent lyric tenors of the future. At the Old Vic he appeared as Tonio in The Daughter of the Regiment, in the title role in Faust
, as Pinkerton in Madama Butterfly
and as Tamino in The Magic Flute
. At the end of the Old Vic season he joined the British National Opera Company, going on tour with the company after a short London season. His roles included Almaviva, Fenton in Falstaff
, Turiddu in Cavalleria rusticana
, Roméo in Roméo et Juliette
, Des Grieux in Manon
and David in Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg
.
In 1929, Nash made his debut at the Royal Opera House
, Covent Garden
as Don Ottavio in Don Giovanni
in the company's International Season. He sang leading tenor roles in Italian and French operas at Covent Garden until World War II, including Almaviva, Pinkerton, Faust, Roméo, Rodolfo in La bohème
, Eisenstein in Die Fledermaus
, Rinuccio in Gianni Schicchi
, and Pedrillo in Die Entführung aus dem Serail
. The critic Alan Blyth
called Nash the leading British lyric tenor of the 20th century, and considered him "ideal casting for the heroes of French 19th-century Romantic opera." Nash had a repertoire of twenty-four operas, and sang fluently in English, French, German and Italian. He was proud of being the first Englishman to sing David in Die Meistersinger in the International Season at Covent Garden.
In the first Glyndebourne
season, in 1934, Nash played Basilio in Le nozze di Figaro
at the inaugural performance, Pedrillo, and Ferrando in Così fan tutte
. He sang these three roles every year until 1938, adding Ottavio in Don Giovanni
in 1937. The critic Richard Capell wrote, "Hardly another tenor of his time has sung Mozart with such elegance and at the same time such a minstrel-like effect of spontaneity." Nash also sang in lighter musical stage works, appearing in Carl Millöcker's The Dubarry
in 1932, and Edward German
's Merrie England
in 1945.
During the war Nash toured with the Carl Rosa Opera Company
, often singing opposite the Australian soprano
Joan Hammond
. His roles included Faust, Pinkerton and Rodolfo. After the Royal Opera House reopened following its wartime closure, Nash sang Des Grieux and David. His last appearance at Covent Garden was in Die Meistersinger in April 1948. He continued to appear on stage until July 1958, when he reprised a character role that he had created a year earlier, Dr Manette in Arthur Benjamin
's A Tale of Two Cities at Sadler's Wells. The Musical Times called it "a most moving performance".
to sing the title role in The Dream of Gerontius
, in a performance conducted by Elgar himself. Henceforth, Nash was closely associated with the part, singing it at every Three Choirs Festival
from 1934 to 1950. The critic Sir Neville Cardus
considered him the greatest of all exponents of the part. Nash's 1945 recording of Gerontius with Malcolm Sargent
is still regarded by many critics as unsurpassed.
Nash sang regularly in Messiah
, and other oratorios. In 1938, he was one of the 16 singers chosen by Ralph Vaughan Williams
to perform his Serenade to Music
, composed as a tribute to Sir Henry Wood
. The work was recorded soon afterwards, with the same 16 singers. This historic performance can be heard on CD re-issues.
In his later years, Nash was appointed professor of singing at the Royal College of Music
. He sang his in his last Messiah a few months before his death from lung cancer on 14 August 1961. On his tombstone in Chislehurst Cemetery are carved the opening words of part two of The Dream of Gerontius: "I went to sleep and now I am refreshed."
during the late 1920s and early 1930s. These were mostly of operatic titles, including arias from The Magic Flute
, Don Giovanni
, Il barbiere di Siviglia
, Lehár
's Frederica
, Jeptha, L'elisir d'amore
and Rigoletto
, plus a number of English songs and ballads. His 1932 Columbia recording of the serenade from Bizet
's La jolie fille de Perth
, sung in English, became a best-seller, making a little-known item of music extremely popular in his homeland. In 1927, he participated in the recording of complete English-language versions of Leoncavallo
's Pagliacci
and Mascagni
's Cavalleria rusticana
with the forces of the British National Opera. In 1935, he recorded a complete Act IV of Puccini
's La bohème
conducted by Beecham. Nash was the tenor in Beecham's first LP recording of Messiah, issued in 1953. The Gramophone wrote, "Those who are apt to remember him as an essentially lyrical tenor should turn up his "Sound an Alarm" from Judas Maccabaeus, which is nothing if not robust."
Tenor
The tenor is a type of male singing voice and is the highest male voice within the modal register. The typical tenor voice lies between C3, the C one octave below middle C, to the A above middle C in choral music, and up to high C in solo work. The low extreme for tenors is roughly B2...
who appeared in opera
Opera
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
and oratorio
Oratorio
An oratorio is a large musical composition including an orchestra, a choir, and soloists. Like an opera, an oratorio includes the use of a choir, soloists, an ensemble, various distinguishable characters, and arias...
in the middle decades of the twentieth century. He also made numerous recordings that are still available on CD reissues.
Nash's voice was of the light tenor class known as "tenore di grazia
Tenore di grazia
Leggiero Tenor, also called tenor leggiero or tenore di grazia, is a lightweight, flexible tenor type of voice. The tenor roles written in the early 19th century Italian operas are invariably leggiero tenor roles, especially those by Rossini such as Lindoro in L'italiana in Algeri, Don Ramiro in La...
". The critic J. B. Steane referred to him as "the English lyric tenor par excellence, without equal then or now." He appeared in tenor roles in operas by Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
, Verdi
Giuseppe Verdi
Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
, Wagner
Richard Wagner
Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...
and Puccini
Giacomo Puccini
Giacomo Antonio Domenico Michele Secondo Maria Puccini was an Italian composer whose operas, including La bohème, Tosca, Madama Butterfly, and Turandot, are among the most frequently performed in the standard repertoire...
among others, at the Royal Opera House
Royal Opera House
The Royal Opera House is an opera house and major performing arts venue in Covent Garden, central London. The large building is often referred to as simply "Covent Garden", after a previous use of the site of the opera house's original construction in 1732. It is the home of The Royal Opera, The...
, and the Glyndebourne Festival
Glyndebourne Festival Opera
Glyndebourne Festival Opera is an English opera festival held at Glyndebourne, an English country house near Lewes, in East Sussex, England.-History:...
. His operatic career lasted from 1924 to 1958.
As a concert singer, Nash was known for his performances in oratorio, and in particular in the title role of Elgar
Edward Elgar
Sir Edward William Elgar, 1st Baronet OM, GCVO was an English composer, many of whose works have entered the British and international classical concert repertoire. Among his best-known compositions are orchestral works including the Enigma Variations, the Pomp and Circumstance Marches, concertos...
's The Dream of Gerontius
The Dream of Gerontius
The Dream of Gerontius, popularly called just Gerontius, is a work for voices and orchestra in two parts composed by Edward Elgar in 1900, to text from the poem by John Henry Newman. It relates the journey of a pious man's soul from his deathbed to his judgment before God and settling into Purgatory...
, making the first gramophone recording of the work, in 1945.
Early years
Nash was born in the South LondonSouth London
South London is the southern part of London, England, United Kingdom.According to the 2011 official Boundary Commission for England definition, South London includes the London boroughs of Bexley, Bromley, Croydon, Greenwich, Kingston, Lambeth, Lewisham, Merton, Southwark, Sutton and...
district of Deptford
Deptford
Deptford is a district of south London, England, located on the south bank of the River Thames. It is named after a ford of the River Ravensbourne, and from the mid 16th century to the late 19th was home to Deptford Dockyard, the first of the Royal Navy Dockyards.Deptford and the docks are...
on 14 June 1894, the son of William Nash, master builder, and his wife, Harriet Emma née Carr. The family was musical, and listening at home to a gramophone record by Caruso prompted Nash to apply for a scholarship at the Blackheath Conservatoire of Music
The Conservatoire
The Conservatoire is an educational charity in Blackheath, on the border of the London boroughs of Greenwich and Lewisham...
. He was accepted, but a week later World War I broke out. Nash joined the army, serving in France, Salonika, Egypt and Palestine.
The Blackheath scholarship was held open until after the war; Nash took it up on his return. He had some experience of concert and oratorio work, and then he accepted an offer to sing with Podrecca and Feodora's Italian Marionettes. Unseen, standing in the orchestra pit of the Scala
Scala Theatre
The Scala Theatre was a theatre in London, sited on Charlotte Street, off Tottenham Court Road, in the London Borough of Camden. The first theatre on the site opened in 1772, and the theatre was demolished in 1969, after being destroyed by fire...
and Coliseum
Coliseum Theatre
The London Coliseum is an opera house and major performing venue on St. Martin's Lane, central London. It is one of London's largest and best equipped theatres and opened in 1904, designed by theatrical architect Frank Matcham , for impresario Oswald Stoll...
theatres, he sang the tenor roles in many Italian operas while on the stages the puppets mimed the action. After the London season, the marionette company secured a contract to appear in New York; Nash went with them. On his return to London a friend advanced the money for him to study in Milan with Giuseppe Borgatti
Giuseppe Borgatti
Giuseppe Borgatti was an Italian dramatic tenor with an outstanding voice...
. On 7 April 1923 Nash married Florence Emily Violet Pearce, daughter of a sign manufacturer. They had two sons, one of whom became an operatic baritone.
While studying with Borgatti, Nash made his operatic debut in 1924 at the Teatro Carcano in Milan, when he replaced an indisposed tenor in the role of Almaviva in Rossini's Il barbiere di Siviglia
The Barber of Seville
The Barber of Seville, or The Futile Precaution is an opera buffa in two acts by Gioachino Rossini with a libretto by Cesare Sterbini. The libretto was based on Pierre Beaumarchais's comedy Le Barbier de Séville , which was originally an opéra comique, or a mixture of spoken play with music...
. It was a notable success. After singing at Turin, Bologna and Genoa, Nash returned to England with his wife in 1925. He had developed an Italianate style of singing that remained with him: it was said of him that he sang everything as though it were by Verdi.
Opera in England
On his return to London Nash was engaged by the Old VicOld Vic
The Old Vic is a theatre located just south-east of Waterloo Station in London on the corner of The Cut and Waterloo Road. Established in 1818 as the Royal Coburg Theatre, it was taken over by Emma Cons in 1880 when it was known formally as the Royal Victoria Hall. In 1898, a niece of Cons, Lilian...
Company under Lilian Baylis
Lilian Baylis
Lilian Mary BaylisCH was an English theatrical producer and manager. She managed the Old Vic and Sadler's Wells theatres in London, and ran an opera company, which became the English National Opera , a theatre company, which evolved into the English National Theatre, and a ballet company, which...
to sing tenor roles in English. His first part for the company was the Duke in Rigoletto
Rigoletto
Rigoletto is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi. The Italian libretto was written by Francesco Maria Piave based on the play Le roi s'amuse by Victor Hugo. It was first performed at La Fenice in Venice on March 11, 1851...
. His success was instantaneous. The Musical Times
The Musical Times
The Musical Times is an academic journal of classical music edited and produced in the United Kingdom. It is currently the oldest such journal that is still publishing in the UK, having been published continuously since 1844. It was published as The Musical Times and Singing Class Circular until...
said that it was a pleasure to welcome a very beautiful tenor voice, praised his clarity of diction, and predicted that Nash would be one of the eminent lyric tenors of the future. At the Old Vic he appeared as Tonio in The Daughter of the Regiment, in the title role in Faust
Faust (opera)
Faust is a drame lyrique in five acts by Charles Gounod to a French libretto by Jules Barbier and Michel Carré from Carré's play Faust et Marguerite, in turn loosely based on Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's Faust, Part 1...
, as Pinkerton in Madama Butterfly
Madama Butterfly
Madama Butterfly is an opera in three acts by Giacomo Puccini, with an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa. Puccini based his opera in part on the short story "Madame Butterfly" by John Luther Long, which was dramatized by David Belasco...
and as Tamino in The Magic Flute
The Magic Flute
The Magic Flute is an opera in two acts composed in 1791 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to a German libretto by Emanuel Schikaneder. The work is in the form of a Singspiel, a popular form that included both singing and spoken dialogue....
. At the end of the Old Vic season he joined the British National Opera Company, going on tour with the company after a short London season. His roles included Almaviva, Fenton in Falstaff
Falstaff (opera)
Falstaff is an operatic commedia lirica in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi, adapted by Arrigo Boito from Shakespeare's plays The Merry Wives of Windsor and scenes from Henry IV. It was Verdi's last opera, written in the composer's ninth decade, and only the second of his 26 operas to be a comedy...
, Turiddu in Cavalleria rusticana
Cavalleria rusticana
Cavalleria rusticana is an opera in one act by Pietro Mascagni to an Italian libretto by Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti and Guido Menasci, adapted from a play written by Giovanni Verga based on his short story. Considered one of the classic verismo operas, it premiered on May 17, 1890 at the Teatro...
, Roméo in Roméo et Juliette
Roméo et Juliette
Roméo et Juliette is an opéra in five acts by Charles Gounod to a French libretto by Jules Barbier and Michel Carré, based on The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare. It was first performed at the Théâtre Lyrique , Paris on 27 April 1867...
, Des Grieux in Manon
Manon
Manon is an opéra comique in five acts by Jules Massenet to a French libretto by Henri Meilhac and Philippe Gille, based on the 1731 novel L’histoire du chevalier des Grieux et de Manon Lescaut by the Abbé Prévost...
and David in Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg
Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg
Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg is an opera in three acts, written and composed by Richard Wagner. It is among the longest operas still commonly performed today, usually taking around four and a half hours. It was first performed at the Königliches Hof- und National-Theater in Munich, on June 21,...
.
In 1929, Nash made his debut at the Royal Opera House
Royal Opera House
The Royal Opera House is an opera house and major performing arts venue in Covent Garden, central London. The large building is often referred to as simply "Covent Garden", after a previous use of the site of the opera house's original construction in 1732. It is the home of The Royal Opera, The...
, Covent Garden
Covent Garden
Covent Garden is a district in London on the eastern fringes of the West End, between St. Martin's Lane and Drury Lane. It is associated with the former fruit and vegetable market in the central square, now a popular shopping and tourist site, and the Royal Opera House, which is also known as...
as Don Ottavio in Don Giovanni
Don Giovanni
Don Giovanni is an opera in two acts with music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and with an Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte. It was premiered by the Prague Italian opera at the Teatro di Praga on October 29, 1787...
in the company's International Season. He sang leading tenor roles in Italian and French operas at Covent Garden until World War II, including Almaviva, Pinkerton, Faust, Roméo, Rodolfo in La bohème
La bohème
La bohème is an opera in four acts,Puccini called the divisions quadro, a tableau or "image", rather than atto . by Giacomo Puccini to an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa, based on Scènes de la vie de bohème by Henri Murger...
, Eisenstein in Die Fledermaus
Die Fledermaus
Die Fledermaus is an operetta composed by Johann Strauss II to a German libretto by Karl Haffner and Richard Genée.- Literary sources :...
, Rinuccio in Gianni Schicchi
Gianni Schicchi
Gianni Schicchi is a comic opera in one act by Giacomo Puccini to an Italian libretto by Giovacchino Forzano, composed in 1917–18. The libretto is based on an incident mentioned in Dante's Divine Comedy. The work is the third and final part of Puccini's Il trittico —three one-act operas with...
, and Pedrillo in Die Entführung aus dem Serail
Die Entführung aus dem Serail
Die Entführung aus dem Serail is an opera Singspiel in three acts by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The German libretto is by Christoph Friedrich Bretzner with adaptations by Gottlieb Stephanie...
. The critic Alan Blyth
Alan Blyth
Geoffrey Alan Blyth was an English music critic, author, and musicologist who was particularly known for his writings within the field of opera. He graduated from the Rugby School before attending the University of Oxford where he studied with Jack Westrup...
called Nash the leading British lyric tenor of the 20th century, and considered him "ideal casting for the heroes of French 19th-century Romantic opera." Nash had a repertoire of twenty-four operas, and sang fluently in English, French, German and Italian. He was proud of being the first Englishman to sing David in Die Meistersinger in the International Season at Covent Garden.
In the first Glyndebourne
Glyndebourne Festival Opera
Glyndebourne Festival Opera is an English opera festival held at Glyndebourne, an English country house near Lewes, in East Sussex, England.-History:...
season, in 1934, Nash played Basilio in Le nozze di Figaro
The Marriage of Figaro
Le nozze di Figaro, ossia la folle giornata , K. 492, is an opera buffa composed in 1786 in four acts by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, with Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte, based on a stage comedy by Pierre Beaumarchais, La folle journée, ou le Mariage de Figaro .Although the play by...
at the inaugural performance, Pedrillo, and Ferrando in Così fan tutte
Così fan tutte
Così fan tutte, ossia La scuola degli amanti K. 588, is an opera buffa by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart first performed in 1790. The libretto was written by Lorenzo Da Ponte....
. He sang these three roles every year until 1938, adding Ottavio in Don Giovanni
Don Giovanni
Don Giovanni is an opera in two acts with music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and with an Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte. It was premiered by the Prague Italian opera at the Teatro di Praga on October 29, 1787...
in 1937. The critic Richard Capell wrote, "Hardly another tenor of his time has sung Mozart with such elegance and at the same time such a minstrel-like effect of spontaneity." Nash also sang in lighter musical stage works, appearing in Carl Millöcker's The Dubarry
Gräfin Dubarry
Gräfin Dubarry is an operetta in three acts by Carl Millöcker to a German libretto by F. Zell and Richard Genée. The story concerns Madame du Barry, the mistress of Louis XV, King of France.-Performance history:...
in 1932, and Edward German
Edward German
Sir Edward German was an English musician and composer of Welsh descent, best remembered for his extensive output of incidental music for the stage and as a successor to Arthur Sullivan in the field of English comic opera.As a youth, German played the violin and led the town orchestra, also...
's Merrie England
Merrie England
Merrie England may also refer to:*Merry England, an idealised conception pastoral English life*Merrie England , a book of essays on socialism by Robert Blatchford* Merrie England , a comic opera by Edward German...
in 1945.
During the war Nash toured with the Carl Rosa Opera Company
Carl Rosa Opera Company
The Carl Rosa Opera Company was founded in 1873 by Carl August Nicholas Rosa, a German-born musical impresario, to present opera in English in London and the British provinces. The company survived Rosa's death in 1889, and continued to present opera in English on tour until 1960, when it was...
, often singing opposite the Australian soprano
Soprano
A soprano is a voice type with a vocal range from approximately middle C to "high A" in choral music, or to "soprano C" or higher in operatic music. In four-part chorale style harmony, the soprano takes the highest part, which usually encompasses the melody...
Joan Hammond
Joan Hammond
Dame Joan Hilda Hood Hammond, DBE, CMG was an Australian operatic soprano, singing coach and champion golfer.- Early life :...
. His roles included Faust, Pinkerton and Rodolfo. After the Royal Opera House reopened following its wartime closure, Nash sang Des Grieux and David. His last appearance at Covent Garden was in Die Meistersinger in April 1948. He continued to appear on stage until July 1958, when he reprised a character role that he had created a year earlier, Dr Manette in Arthur Benjamin
Arthur Benjamin
Arthur Leslie Benjamin was an Australian composer, pianist, conductor and teacher. He is best known as the composer of Jamaican Rhumba, composed in 1938.-Biography:...
's A Tale of Two Cities at Sadler's Wells. The Musical Times called it "a most moving performance".
Oratorio and later career
Nash's career was not restricted to opera; he gave many song recitals, made radio broadcasts and performed in concerts and oratorio productions all over Britain. In 1931, he was chosen by Sir Edward ElgarEdward Elgar
Sir Edward William Elgar, 1st Baronet OM, GCVO was an English composer, many of whose works have entered the British and international classical concert repertoire. Among his best-known compositions are orchestral works including the Enigma Variations, the Pomp and Circumstance Marches, concertos...
to sing the title role in The Dream of Gerontius
The Dream of Gerontius
The Dream of Gerontius, popularly called just Gerontius, is a work for voices and orchestra in two parts composed by Edward Elgar in 1900, to text from the poem by John Henry Newman. It relates the journey of a pious man's soul from his deathbed to his judgment before God and settling into Purgatory...
, in a performance conducted by Elgar himself. Henceforth, Nash was closely associated with the part, singing it at every Three Choirs Festival
Three Choirs Festival
The Three Choirs Festival is a music festival held each August alternately at the cathedrals of the Three Counties and originally featuring their three choirs, which remain central to the week-long programme...
from 1934 to 1950. The critic Sir Neville Cardus
Neville Cardus
Sir John Frederick Neville Cardus CBE was an English writer and critic, best known for his writing on music and cricket. For many years, he wrote for The Manchester Guardian. He was untrained in music, and his style of criticism was subjective, romantic and personal, in contrast with his critical...
considered him the greatest of all exponents of the part. Nash's 1945 recording of Gerontius with Malcolm Sargent
Malcolm Sargent
Sir Harold Malcolm Watts Sargent was an English conductor, organist and composer widely regarded as Britain's leading conductor of choral works...
is still regarded by many critics as unsurpassed.
Nash sang regularly in Messiah
Messiah (Handel)
Messiah is an English-language oratorio composed in 1741 by George Frideric Handel, with a scriptural text compiled by Charles Jennens from the King James Bible and the Book of Common Prayer. It was first performed in Dublin on 13 April 1742, and received its London premiere nearly a year later...
, and other oratorios. In 1938, he was one of the 16 singers chosen by Ralph Vaughan Williams
Ralph Vaughan Williams
Ralph Vaughan Williams OM was an English composer of symphonies, chamber music, opera, choral music, and film scores. He was also a collector of English folk music and song: this activity both influenced his editorial approach to the English Hymnal, beginning in 1904, in which he included many...
to perform his Serenade to Music
Serenade to Music
Serenade to Music is a work by Ralph Vaughan Williams for 16 vocal soloists and orchestra, composed in 1938. The text is an adaptation of the discussion about music and the music of the spheres in Act V, Scene 1 of The Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare. Vaughan Williams later arranged...
, composed as a tribute to Sir Henry Wood
Henry Wood
Henry Wood was a British conductor.Henry Wood may also refer to:* Henry C. Wood , American Civil War Medal of Honor recipient* Henry Wood , English cricketer...
. The work was recorded soon afterwards, with the same 16 singers. This historic performance can be heard on CD re-issues.
In his later years, Nash was appointed professor of singing at the Royal College of Music
Royal College of Music
The Royal College of Music is a conservatoire founded by Royal Charter in 1882, located in South Kensington, London, England.-Background:The first director was Sir George Grove and he was followed by Sir Hubert Parry...
. He sang his in his last Messiah a few months before his death from lung cancer on 14 August 1961. On his tombstone in Chislehurst Cemetery are carved the opening words of part two of The Dream of Gerontius: "I went to sleep and now I am refreshed."
Recordings
Many of Nash's recordings have been reissued on compact disc. He made his first recordings for Columbia RecordsColumbia Graphophone Company
The Columbia Graphophone Company was one of the earliest gramophone companies in the United Kingdom. Under EMI, as Columbia Records, it became a very successful label in the 1950s and 1960s...
during the late 1920s and early 1930s. These were mostly of operatic titles, including arias from The Magic Flute
The Magic Flute
The Magic Flute is an opera in two acts composed in 1791 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to a German libretto by Emanuel Schikaneder. The work is in the form of a Singspiel, a popular form that included both singing and spoken dialogue....
, Don Giovanni
Don Giovanni
Don Giovanni is an opera in two acts with music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and with an Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte. It was premiered by the Prague Italian opera at the Teatro di Praga on October 29, 1787...
, Il barbiere di Siviglia
The Barber of Seville
The Barber of Seville, or The Futile Precaution is an opera buffa in two acts by Gioachino Rossini with a libretto by Cesare Sterbini. The libretto was based on Pierre Beaumarchais's comedy Le Barbier de Séville , which was originally an opéra comique, or a mixture of spoken play with music...
, Lehár
Franz Lehár
Franz Lehár was an Austrian-Hungarian composer. He is mainly known for his operettas of which the most successful and best known is The Merry Widow .-Biography:...
's Frederica
Frederica
Frederica may refer to:* Frederica * Frederica , a romance novel by Georgette Heyer* Frederica, Delaware, United States* Frederica Academy, an American school* Fort Frederica, a historic American fort...
, Jeptha, L'elisir d'amore
L'elisir d'amore
L'elisir d'amore is an opera by the Italian composer Gaetano Donizetti. It is a melodramma giocoso in two acts...
and Rigoletto
Rigoletto
Rigoletto is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi. The Italian libretto was written by Francesco Maria Piave based on the play Le roi s'amuse by Victor Hugo. It was first performed at La Fenice in Venice on March 11, 1851...
, plus a number of English songs and ballads. His 1932 Columbia recording of the serenade from Bizet
Georges Bizet
Georges Bizet formally Alexandre César Léopold Bizet, was a French composer, mainly of operas. In a career cut short by his early death, he achieved few successes before his final work, Carmen, became one of the most popular and frequently performed works in the entire opera repertory.During a...
's La jolie fille de Perth
La jolie fille de Perth
La jolie fille de Perth is an opera in four acts by Georges Bizet , from a libretto by Jules-Henri Vernoy de Saint-Georges and Jules Adenis, after the novel by Sir Walter Scott...
, sung in English, became a best-seller, making a little-known item of music extremely popular in his homeland. In 1927, he participated in the recording of complete English-language versions of Leoncavallo
Ruggero Leoncavallo
Ruggero Leoncavallo was an Italian opera composer. His two-act work Pagliacci remains one of the most popular works in the repertory, appearing as number 20 on the Operabase list of the most-performed operas worldwide.-Biography:...
's Pagliacci
Pagliacci
Pagliacci , sometimes incorrectly rendered with a definite article as I Pagliacci, is an opera consisting of a prologue and two acts written and composed by Ruggero Leoncavallo. It recounts the tragedy of a jealous husband in a commedia dell'arte troupe...
and Mascagni
Pietro Mascagni
Pietro Antonio Stefano Mascagni was an Italian composer most noted for his operas. His 1890 masterpiece Cavalleria rusticana caused one of the greatest sensations in opera history and single-handedly ushered in the Verismo movement in Italian dramatic music...
's Cavalleria rusticana
Cavalleria rusticana
Cavalleria rusticana is an opera in one act by Pietro Mascagni to an Italian libretto by Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti and Guido Menasci, adapted from a play written by Giovanni Verga based on his short story. Considered one of the classic verismo operas, it premiered on May 17, 1890 at the Teatro...
with the forces of the British National Opera. In 1935, he recorded a complete Act IV of Puccini
Giacomo Puccini
Giacomo Antonio Domenico Michele Secondo Maria Puccini was an Italian composer whose operas, including La bohème, Tosca, Madama Butterfly, and Turandot, are among the most frequently performed in the standard repertoire...
's La bohème
La bohème
La bohème is an opera in four acts,Puccini called the divisions quadro, a tableau or "image", rather than atto . by Giacomo Puccini to an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa, based on Scènes de la vie de bohème by Henri Murger...
conducted by Beecham. Nash was the tenor in Beecham's first LP recording of Messiah, issued in 1953. The Gramophone wrote, "Those who are apt to remember him as an essentially lyrical tenor should turn up his "Sound an Alarm" from Judas Maccabaeus, which is nothing if not robust."
Biographies
- Allen, Eleanor (2010) Heddle Nash: Singing Against the Tide". Jubilee House Press. ISBN 978-0-9565996-0-5