May Brahe
Encyclopedia
May Brahe was an Australia
n composer, best known for her songs and ballads. Her most famous song by far is "Bless This House
", recorded by John McCormack, Beniamino Gigli
, Lesley Garrett
and Bryn Terfel
. She was the only Australian woman composer to win local and international recognition before World War II
, having 290 of her 500 songs published. Of these, 248 were written under her own name, the remainder under aliases.
in 1884. She was known as May from an early age. Her father was native born and her mother Scottish. She studied piano with her mother, then at Stratherne Girls' School, Hawthorn
, and later with Mona McBurney and the singer Alice Rebotarro.
In 1903, she married Frederick Brahe, and they had two sons and a daughter. By 1910 she was playing in a trio with George W. L. Marshall-Hall
, and accompanying singers. In 1912 she left for London
to establish herself as a composer, leaving her children behind. Her first success was the song It's Quiet Down Here. In 1914 she returned to Australia, but only for long enough to bring her family back to England.
Brahe published under her married name and nine pseudonym
s. This allowed more frequent publication, as publishers were reluctant to publish more than four of her songs in a year. The names she composed under included: Mervyn Banks, Mary Hannah Brahe, Donald Crichton, Stanley Dickson, Alison Dodd, Stanton Douglas, Eric Faulkner, Wilbur B. Fox, Henry Lovell, Mary Hanna Morgan and George Pointer.
In 1919, her husband was killed in a motor accident. In 1922, in London, she married an Australian-born actor George Albert Morgan. When her publisher was taken over by Boosey & Hawkes
in 1925, she became one of their few composers on an annual retainer. In the next eighteen years she published 400 compositions, mainly ballads. Dame Nellie Melba
, Peter Dawson, John Charles Thomas
and other singers recorded her songs, many of which were chosen as items for school concerts in the United Kingdom, Australia and the United States
.
She made settings of poems by William Blake
, Robert Browning
, Robert Herrick
, Walter de la Mare
, Dorothea Mackellar
and living lyricists such as Helen Taylor, Madge Dickson (her sister), and P. J. O'Reilly. Helen Taylor was her most frequent collaborator, including Bless This House
(1927). This simple song became world-famous in recordings by singers such as John McCormack, Peter Dawson, Jan Peerce
, Beniamino Gigli
and Josef Locke
, through to Vera Lynn
, Doris Day
and Perry Como
, and continues its popularity in the present day, with recordings by Benjamin Luxon
, Leontyne Price
, Lesley Garrett
and Bryn Terfel
.
She wrote musical comedies, including Castles in Spain, with a libretto by Sydney
and Muriel Box
. She returned to Australia in 1939 and lived in semi-retirement. She lived comfortably from song royalties. She died at Bellevue Hill
, Sydney
in 1956; she was survived by two sons and a daughter of her first marriage and a son of her second.
Cantatas
Musical comedy
Piano solo
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
n composer, best known for her songs and ballads. Her most famous song by far is "Bless This House
Bless This House (song)
"Bless This House" is a song. The words were written by Englishwoman Helen Taylor, a poet, under the original title "Bless the House." The music was composed by Australian May Brahe, a friend of Taylor's. It was published in 1927....
", recorded by John McCormack, Beniamino Gigli
Beniamino Gigli
Beniamino Gigli was an Italian opera singer. The most famous tenor of his generation, he was renowned internationally for the great beauty of his voice and the soundness of his vocal technique. Music critics sometimes took him to task, however, for what was perceived to be the over-emotionalism...
, Lesley Garrett
Lesley Garrett
Lesley Garrett CBE is an English musician, broadcaster and media personality.- Early life :Garrett was born in the town of Thorne near Doncaster in South Yorkshire, into a musical family. She attended Thorne Grammar School, where she performed in school plays and musicals. As she grew up she...
and Bryn Terfel
Bryn Terfel
Bryn Terfel Jones CBE is a Welsh bass-baritone opera and concert singer. Terfel was initially associated with the roles of Mozart, particularly Figaro and Leporello, but has subsequently shifted his attention to heavier roles, especially those by Wagner....
. She was the only Australian woman composer to win local and international recognition before World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, having 290 of her 500 songs published. Of these, 248 were written under her own name, the remainder under aliases.
Biography
Mary Hannah Dickson was born in East MelbourneEast Melbourne, Victoria
East Melbourne is a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, adjacent to Melbourne's central business district. Its Local Government Area is the City of Melbourne. At the 2006 Census, East Melbourne had a population of 4,330....
in 1884. She was known as May from an early age. Her father was native born and her mother Scottish. She studied piano with her mother, then at Stratherne Girls' School, Hawthorn
Hawthorn, Victoria
Hawthorn is a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, east from Melbourne's central business district. Its Local Government Area is the City of Boroondara...
, and later with Mona McBurney and the singer Alice Rebotarro.
In 1903, she married Frederick Brahe, and they had two sons and a daughter. By 1910 she was playing in a trio with George W. L. Marshall-Hall
Marshall Hall (musician)
George William Louis Marshall-Hall was an English-born musician, composer, conductor, poet and controversialist who lived and worked in Australia from 1891 till his death in 1915...
, and accompanying singers. In 1912 she left for 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...
to establish herself as a composer, leaving her children behind. Her first success was the song It's Quiet Down Here. In 1914 she returned to Australia, but only for long enough to bring her family back to England.
Brahe published under her married name and nine pseudonym
Pseudonym
A pseudonym is a name that a person assumes for a particular purpose and that differs from his or her original orthonym...
s. This allowed more frequent publication, as publishers were reluctant to publish more than four of her songs in a year. The names she composed under included: Mervyn Banks, Mary Hannah Brahe, Donald Crichton, Stanley Dickson, Alison Dodd, Stanton Douglas, Eric Faulkner, Wilbur B. Fox, Henry Lovell, Mary Hanna Morgan and George Pointer.
In 1919, her husband was killed in a motor accident. In 1922, in London, she married an Australian-born actor George Albert Morgan. When her publisher was taken over by Boosey & Hawkes
Boosey & Hawkes
Boosey & Hawkes is a British music publisher purported to be the largest specialist classical music publisher in the world. Until 2003, it was also a major manufacturer of brass, string and wind musical instruments....
in 1925, she became one of their few composers on an annual retainer. In the next eighteen years she published 400 compositions, mainly ballads. Dame Nellie Melba
Nellie Melba
Dame Nellie Melba GBE , born Helen "Nellie" Porter Mitchell, was an Australian operatic soprano. She became one of the most famous singers of the late Victorian Era and the early 20th century...
, Peter Dawson, John Charles Thomas
John Charles Thomas
John Charles Thomas was a popular American opera, operetta and concert baritone.-Birth, schooling and stage debut:...
and other singers recorded her songs, many of which were chosen as items for school concerts in the United Kingdom, Australia and the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
.
She made settings of poems by William Blake
William Blake
William Blake was an English poet, painter, and printmaker. Largely unrecognised during his lifetime, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of both the poetry and visual arts of the Romantic Age...
, Robert Browning
Robert Browning
Robert Browning was an English poet and playwright whose mastery of dramatic verse, especially dramatic monologues, made him one of the foremost Victorian poets.-Early years:...
, Robert Herrick
Robert Herrick
Robert Herrick may refer to:* Robert Herrick , American novelist* Robert Herrick , English poet...
, Walter de la Mare
Walter de la Mare
Walter John de la Mare , OM CH was an English poet, short story writer and novelist, probably best remembered for his works for children and the poem "The Listeners"....
, Dorothea Mackellar
Dorothea Mackellar
Isobel Marion Dorothea Mackellar, OBE was an Australian poet and fiction writer.The only daughter of noted physician and parliamentarian Sir Charles Mackellar, she was born in Sydney in 1885...
and living lyricists such as Helen Taylor, Madge Dickson (her sister), and P. J. O'Reilly. Helen Taylor was her most frequent collaborator, including Bless This House
Bless This House (song)
"Bless This House" is a song. The words were written by Englishwoman Helen Taylor, a poet, under the original title "Bless the House." The music was composed by Australian May Brahe, a friend of Taylor's. It was published in 1927....
(1927). This simple song became world-famous in recordings by singers such as John McCormack, Peter Dawson, Jan Peerce
Jan Peerce
Jan Peerce was an American operatic tenor. Peerce was an accomplished performer on the operatic and Broadway concert stages, in solo recitals, and as a recording artist. He is the father of film director Larry Peerce....
, Beniamino Gigli
Beniamino Gigli
Beniamino Gigli was an Italian opera singer. The most famous tenor of his generation, he was renowned internationally for the great beauty of his voice and the soundness of his vocal technique. Music critics sometimes took him to task, however, for what was perceived to be the over-emotionalism...
and Josef Locke
Josef Locke
Josef Locke was the stage name of Joseph McLaughlin , a tenor singer who was successful in the United Kingdom and Ireland in the 1940s and 1950s....
, through to Vera Lynn
Vera Lynn
Dame Vera Lynn, DBE is an English singer-songwriter and actress whose musical recordings and performances were enormously popular during World War II. During the war she toured Egypt, India and Burma, giving outdoor concerts for the troops...
, Doris Day
Doris Day
Doris Day is an American actress, singer and, since her retirement from show business, an animal rights activist. With an entertainment career that spanned through almost 50 years, Day started her career as a big band singer in 1939, but only began to be noticed after her first hit recording,...
and Perry Como
Perry Como
Pierino Ronald "Perry" Como was an American singer and television personality. During a career spanning more than half a century he recorded exclusively for the RCA Victor label after signing with them in 1943. "Mr...
, and continues its popularity in the present day, with recordings by Benjamin Luxon
Benjamin Luxon
Benjamin Matthew Luxon CBE is a retired British baritone.-Biography:He studied with Walter Grünner at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama and established an international reputation as a singer when he won a third prize at the 1961 ARD International Music Competition in Munich...
, Leontyne Price
Leontyne Price
Mary Violet Leontyne Price is an American soprano. Born and raised in the Deep South, she rose to international acclaim in the 1950s and 1960s, and was one of the first African Americans to become a leading artist at the Metropolitan Opera.One critic characterized Price's voice as "vibrant",...
, Lesley Garrett
Lesley Garrett
Lesley Garrett CBE is an English musician, broadcaster and media personality.- Early life :Garrett was born in the town of Thorne near Doncaster in South Yorkshire, into a musical family. She attended Thorne Grammar School, where she performed in school plays and musicals. As she grew up she...
and Bryn Terfel
Bryn Terfel
Bryn Terfel Jones CBE is a Welsh bass-baritone opera and concert singer. Terfel was initially associated with the roles of Mozart, particularly Figaro and Leporello, but has subsequently shifted his attention to heavier roles, especially those by Wagner....
.
She wrote musical comedies, including Castles in Spain, with a libretto by Sydney
Sydney Box
Sydney Box was a British film producer and screenwriter, brother of another prominent British filmmaker, Betty Box. He produced the postwar screenplay, The Seventh Veil, which earned him the 1946 Oscar for best original screenplay with his then wife Muriel Box after which the couple were hired by...
and Muriel Box
Muriel Box
Muriel Box was a prolific English screenwriter and director in what at the time was basically a male industry, and is generally considered to be one of the most successful females in the history of British film....
. She returned to Australia in 1939 and lived in semi-retirement. She lived comfortably from song royalties. She died at Bellevue Hill
Bellevue Hill, New South Wales
Bellevue Hill is an eastern suburb of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Bellevue Hill is an affluent suburb, located 5 kilometres east of the Sydney central business district, in the local government area of the Municipality of Woollahra....
, Sydney
Sydney
Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...
in 1956; she was survived by two sons and a daughter of her first marriage and a son of her second.
Musical compositions using the name May H. Brahe (incomplete)
Songs- As I Went a’Roaming (Helen Taylor), Enoch & Sons publisher
- Beaux and Belles (Helen Taylor)
- The Country Dance
- Bless This House (Helen Taylor)
- By Road and River, 5 songs (Helen Taylor)
- O Western Wind!
- Red Roofs
- The Call of the Maytime (Helen Taylor)
- Children of All Nations (Lucie Smith)
- Close Thine Eyes (adapted from lyrics by King Charles I of EnglandCharles I of EnglandCharles I was King of England, King of Scotland, and King of Ireland from 27 March 1625 until his execution in 1649. Charles engaged in a struggle for power with the Parliament of England, attempting to obtain royal revenue whilst Parliament sought to curb his Royal prerogative which Charles...
) - Coming Home Along (Nancie B. Marsland)
- Country Folk (Helen Taylor)
- Cradle Me Low (Helen Taylor)
- Cuckoo Calls (Helen Taylor)
- The Days of Old (Porter Emerson Brown)
- Down Here (P. J. O'Reilly), Enoch & Sons publisher
- Evening Shadows (Jean Crichton)
- The Everlasting Love (Helen Taylor)
- Four Songs from "Peacock Pie" (Walter de la MareWalter de la MareWalter John de la Mare , OM CH was an English poet, short story writer and novelist, probably best remembered for his works for children and the poem "The Listeners"....
)- The Old Stone House
- From Far and Near (Alban Gordon)
- Galloping Dreary Dun (adapted by P. J. O'Reilly)
- Give Me Your Hand (George Cooper)
- Good-bye, and God be with You (P. J. O'Reilly)
- Guess You Know (Helen Taylor)
- The Haunting Little Tune (Harold George)
- I Passed by your Window (unknown author), Enoch & Sons publisher
- I Thought I'd Forgotten (But Still I Remember) (Helen Taylor)
- I Walked in My Garden (Harold George)
- In a Month of Sundays (Dorothy Dickinson)
- A Japanese Love Song (Madge Dickson), Enoch & Sons publisher, 1910
- Jennifer (Royden Barrie)
- Keep Thou My Heart (Edward Lockton)
- Last Night (Shirley Darbyshire)
- A Leafy Wood (Jean Lucas)
- Life's Balcony (Helen Taylor)
- Listen, Mary (Constance Wilford)
- Little Bird (Dorothy Harrison)
- A Little Green Lane (Desmond Carter)
- Little Lamb (William BlakeWilliam BlakeWilliam Blake was an English poet, painter, and printmaker. Largely unrecognised during his lifetime, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of both the poetry and visual arts of the Romantic Age...
) - Look Up to the Sunrise (Edward Lockton)
- Love and Life, 5 little songs
- Love Me Little, Love Me Long (Anonymous)
- Marjorie (Walter Learned)
- Matthew, Mark, Luke and John (adapted by Walter de la Mare)
- Messengers (Helen Taylor)
- My Dear Old Town (Arthur L. Salmon)
- A Northern Lament (Helen Taylor)
- Nothing to Say (Fred E. Weatherly)
- The Nutmeg Tree (adapted by Margaret Lucas)
- A Parting Prayer (John Marvell)
- My Prayer for You (Margaret Dickson)
- Off to the Greenwood (Helen Taylor)
- Oh, Pray for Peace (Helen Taylor)
- A Pageant of Summer, song cycle for 4 voices (Helen Taylor):
- Meadowsweet
- None-so-pretty
- Traveller's Joy
- The Piper from Over the Way (Helen Taylor)
- A Prayer in Absence (Helen Taylor)
- The Queen (Alex C. Welsh)
- Real Australian Children Songs (Madge Dickson)
- Ring-Time (Helen Taylor)
- She is All So Slight (Richard Aldington)
- Shy Mignonette (Helen Taylor)
- Sitting at Home by the Fire (Helen Taylor)
- Sleep, Pretty Babe
- Song of a Cretan Warrior (Thomas Campbell)
- A Song of Exile (P. J. O'Reilly)
- Song Pictures, 5 songs (Helen Taylor)
- I Passed By Your Window
- To a Miniature
- Spindrift, 5 songs (Ethel Tindal Atkinson/Madge Dickson)
- Spring Blossoms, 4 little songs (Morris Hazlitt/Madge Dickson/Robert HerrickRobert HerrickRobert Herrick may refer to:* Robert Herrick , American novelist* Robert Herrick , English poet...
) - Spring is on the Way (Jean Crichton)
- Sweet and Low
- That's All (Helen Taylor)
- There's a Whisper in the Air (Nancie B. Marsland)
- Through the April Meadows (Helen Taylor)
- Two Little Words (Helen Taylor)
- Two Songs (Robert BrowningRobert BrowningRobert Browning was an English poet and playwright whose mastery of dramatic verse, especially dramatic monologues, made him one of the foremost Victorian poets.-Early years:...
)- Oh, to be in England
- The Year's at the Spring
- When I Hear a Song-Lark (Morris Hazlitt)
- The Wide Brown Land (Dorothea MackellarDorothea MackellarIsobel Marion Dorothea Mackellar, OBE was an Australian poet and fiction writer.The only daughter of noted physician and parliamentarian Sir Charles Mackellar, she was born in Sydney in 1885...
) - Years Ago (Helen Taylor)
- You'll Come Home Again (Harold George)
- Yours Alone (Helen Taylor)
Cantatas
- Dame Durden's School, juvenile cantata
- The Magic Wood, juvenile cantata
Musical comedy
- Castles in Spain, a South-American musical romance (libretto: Sydney BoxSydney BoxSydney Box was a British film producer and screenwriter, brother of another prominent British filmmaker, Betty Box. He produced the postwar screenplay, The Seventh Veil, which earned him the 1946 Oscar for best original screenplay with his then wife Muriel Box after which the couple were hired by...
, Montgomery Tully; lyrics: Harold V. Purcell, Muriel BoxMuriel BoxMuriel Box was a prolific English screenwriter and director in what at the time was basically a male industry, and is generally considered to be one of the most successful females in the history of British film....
)
Piano solo
- Gay Pastorale
- Marita
- Minuet for Ninon
- Toy Town Patrol
Musical compositions using the name Stanley Dickson
- Crying for the Moon (Dorothy M. Tweedale)
- Dancing Days (Helen Taylor)
- God Bless You (Kathleen Stuart)
- Little Brown Cottage (Greatrex Newman)
- Thanks Be to God (P. J. O'Reilly)