Composer in Interview: Edward Rushton – an Englishman in Switzerland

Extract

A time there was when it was de rigueur for the self-respecting English composer to sample the life and art of our Germanic neighbours. A little time in the Land der Musik, it seemed, might help them make their own a little less ohne. Elgar supped at the springs in the Bavarian Highlands; Sullivan, Stanford and others in the Leipzig low-lands. It remains perplexing to the German mind that a reference to the ‘Frankfurt School’ in conversation with an Englishman can elicit praise for Percy Grainger, Roger Quilter and Co., but not a word about Adorno. Even Britten would have studied with Alban Berg, had the RCM not declared him ‘immoral’, thus forcing Ben to seek out immorality closer to home. To be sure, the rise of National Socialism reversed the tide for a while (the present writer is typical of his generation in that he owes the quality of his musical education to German-Jewish émigrés). But Gemiania proves today as seductive as ever to the English. Thanks to better pay and employment prospects, our finest graduates are regularly lured across the water to join their countrymen in maintaining the high standards of provincial German opera houses and orchestras. Our composers might on the whole be not as popular; but mentioning the name of Brian Ferneyhough still elicits the same mixture of awe, reverence and enthusiasm in German conservatories and radio studios as would a reference to the Pope in Cracow or to David Beckham at Old Trafford.