Why British music will always be European
Celebrate the musical giants who transformed British music-making with 10 of our favourite musical influencers
Johannes Brahms (1833-97)
Born in Hamburg and active in Vienna, Brahms was in awe of his fellow citizen Beethoven, whose nine symphonies influenced his own four. Worcestershire composer Edward Elgar, in his turn, studied in Germany and revered Brahms's symphonies. Nationalists like to claim Elgar as their own, but he was firmly in the European Romantic tradition, and passionately against conflict. Listen here to Elgar's Cello Concerto with Sheku Kanneh-Mason (below) at the 2019 BBC Proms
Felix Mendelssohn (1809-47)
With his composer and pianist sister Fanny, Mendelssohn was at the heart of the Leipzig music scene, alongside Clara Schumann and her husband Robert. Mendelssohn had a huge influence on the grand works of William Sterndale-Bennett, who invited him to Leipzig (pictured). While few play Sterndale-Bennett's works today, he is feted alongside all the British greats at the old Guildhall School of Music building in John Carpenter Street in the City. Watch Suzy Klein's story of Hitler banning Mendelssohn here.
Giuseppe Verdi (1813-1901)
The composer of dozens of operas and the mighty Requiem, Verdi's heartfelt choruses provide the soundtrack to Italian nationalism. But they also influenced a brilliant parodist and would-be serious composer, Arthur Sullivan, collaborator with WS Gilbert on evergreen operettas such The Pirates of Penzance and Iolanthe (pictured at English National Opera). Sullivan could capture a Verdian swell with wit and style. Listen to Donald Macleod's BBC Radio 3 Composer of the Week programme on Verdi's opera here.
George Frideric Handel (1685-1759)
Handel was born in Halle, Germany, but he made his home in London, where his Brook Street house in Mayfair is today a must-see for all music-lovers. He influenced... well, everything and everybody on the London music scene in the first half of the 18th century. While he wrote operas at a rate of knots, and then, as his style fell out of fashion, oratorios, local composers worked hard to keep up. Today new generations of singers, players and creatives find endless new possibilities in his vast output. Watch Messiah performed under Covid restrictions at his church, St George's, Hanover Square, for the annual London Handel Festival here.
Claudio Monteverdi (1567-1643)
The sinuous, dramatic madrigals of Italian composer Claudio Monteverdi had a profound influence on England’s Henry Purcell, who also fell under the spell of French baroque opera, in particular the works of Jean-Baptiste Lully, composer to the court of Louis XIV. Listen here to Purcell’s heartbreaking Lament, sung by Joyce Didonato (pictured), from his 1689 Dido and Aeneas, the first true English opera, bears all the hallmarks of Continental inspiration.
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-91)
No Mozart, no Glyndebourne, although that was not the intention of the premier country opera house's founder, John Christie, who had his eyes and ears on Wagner. But it was the vision and expertise of German migrants, including director Carl Ebert and musical director Fritz Busch, that made the then tiny house a world-class venue, a status it still enjoys, 85 years later. They recognised that Mozart's rich, intricate and jewel-like operas were perfect for these refined surroundings. Next year Glyndebourne's season include Die Zauberflöte (The Magic Flute, pictured) and Così Fan Tutte. See how Glyndebourne overcame Covid restrictions to perform live this summer, here.
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)
It’s hard to name any composer of the past 200 years who doesn’t bow down before the influencer of them all, Johann Sebastian Bach, an essential reference point for anyone putting dots on a stave. And yet it wasn’t until the 19th century that this German genius was truly recognised and his great keyboard and choral works fully appreciated, many written for Leipzig (pictured). Here, generations, from Charles Villiers Stanford to Benjamin Britten, drew from that everlasting well-spring of inspiration. Listen here to BBC Radio 3's Tom Service on Bach's genius.
Maurice Ravel (1875-1937)
Today, it’s popular to pigeon-hole Ralph Vaughan Williams as the composer who brought English folk song to the concert hall with his arrangements and suites, but his musical imagination reached far wider horizons. His vast symphonies draw on his time studying both in Berlin with Max Bruch and in Paris with Maurice Ravel. The influence of his three months with Ravel in 1908 can be heard here in his Pastoral Symphony, which at first sounds like an English idyll but in reality is an evocation of the French landscape.
Georges Bizet (1838-75)
Georges Bizet, the French composer of probably the most popular Spanish music not written by a Spaniard – his opera Carmen (pictured) – seems an unlikely source of inspiration for Lancashire-born composer Frederick Delius. Bizet was the master of the smash-hit tune, while Delius would rather dwell on the liquid beauty of orchestral colour and chromatic harmony – as in On Hearing the First Cuckoo in Spring. He also adored the orchestral works of Claude Debussy, but, ever the contrarian, he hated Debussy’s piano works.
Andrzej Panufnik (1914-91)
The deft and versatile London-born contemporary composer Roxanna Panufnik (pictured) is among the British musical elite. Her father was the eminent Polish composer Sir Andrzej Panufnik, and she admits that “a few stray remarks about nepotism dented my confidence... Now I’m thrilled to be regularly programmed alongside him and I’m so proud of where and who I came from – and my Polish roots.” Listen here to a whole programme of Roxanna's amazingly varied music.