Dulcie Sybil Holland AM (5 January 1913 – 21 May 2000) was an Australian composer and music educator. Best known for her contributions to music education through her involvement with the

Australian Music Examinations Board The Australian Music Examinations Board (AMEB) is a federated, privately funded corporation which provides a program of examinations for music, speech and drama in Australia. The organisation had its beginnings at the Universities of Melbourne ...

, Holland has in recent decades gained greater recognition as a composer. She is now regarded by some critics as one of the more significant Australian composers of her generation.

Education

Holland was born in

Sydney Sydney is the capital city of the States and territories of Australia, state of New South Wales and the List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city in Australia. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Syd ...

in 1913. She began taking piano lessons at the age of six, and attended Shirley School for Girls, known for its academic excellence. In 1929 she entered the New South Wales Conservatorium of Music (now the

Sydney Conservatorium The Sydney Conservatorium of Music (SCM) — formerly the New South Wales State Conservatorium of Music, and known by the moniker "The Con" — is the music school of the University of Sydney. It is one of the oldest and most prestigious music ...

) to continue her studies. At the Conservatorium she studied

piano A piano is a keyboard instrument that produces sound when its keys are depressed, activating an Action (music), action mechanism where hammers strike String (music), strings. Modern pianos have a row of 88 black and white keys, tuned to a c ...

with Grace Middenway and Frank Hutchens,

cello The violoncello ( , ), commonly abbreviated as cello ( ), is a middle pitched bowed (sometimes pizzicato, plucked and occasionally col legno, hit) string instrument of the violin family. Its four strings are usually intonation (music), tuned i ...

with Gladstone Bell, and composition with

Roy Agnew Roy Ewing "Robert" Agnew (23 August 1891 – 12 November 1944) was an Australian composer, pianist, teacher, and radio announcer. He was described as "the most outstanding of the early twentieth-century Australian composers" by Morris Hinson.Hin ...

and Alfred Hill, eventually completing both the Diploma course (DSCM) and the Licentiate of the Royal Schools of Music (LRSM) in 1933. In 1937, Holland travelled to

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

to study composition at the

Royal College of Music The Royal College of Music (RCM) is a conservatoire established by royal charter in 1882, located in South Kensington, London, UK. It offers training from the undergraduate to the doctoral level in all aspects of Western Music including pe ...

with

John Ireland John Benjamin Ireland (January 30, 1914 – March 21, 1992) was a Canadian-American actor and film director. Born in Vancouver, British Columbia and raised in New York City, he came to prominence with film audiences for his supporting roles i ...

. At the end of her first year, she won the Blumenthal Scholarship for composition, which entitled her to another three years of study at the College. The following year she won the

Cobbett Prize Walter Willson Cobbett (11 July 184722 January 1937) was an English businessman, amateur violinist and an influential patron of British chamber music from the decade before World War I until his death in 1937. He was an innovative and astute b ...

for

chamber music Chamber music is a form of classical music that is composed for a small group of Musical instrument, instruments—traditionally a group that could fit in a Great chamber, palace chamber or a large room. Most broadly, it includes any art music ...

, but with the outbreak of

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

in 1939, decided to return to Australia. Several years after the war, in 1951, she returned to the United Kingdom for a year to study

serialism In music, serialism is a method of composition using series of pitches, rhythms, dynamics, timbres or other musical elements. Serialism began primarily with Arnold Schoenberg's twelve-tone technique, though some of his contemporaries were also ...

with

Mátyás Seiber Mátyás György Seiber (, sometimes given as Matthis Seyber; 4 May 1905 – 24 September 1960) was a Hungarian-born British composer who lived and worked in the United Kingdom from 1935 onwards. His work linked many diverse musical influences, ...

Career

After returning to Australia from the Royal College in 1939, Holland embarked on a career as a recitalist and freelance composer. In 1940 she married the Australian

conductor Conductor or conduction may refer to: Biology and medicine * Bone conduction, the conduction of sound to the inner ear * Conduction aphasia, a language disorder Mathematics * Conductor (ring theory) * Conductor of an abelian variety * Cond ...

Alan Bellhouse, with whom she had two children. During the 1940s, in addition to her childrearing and composing, she wrote a number of children's books, under her married name of Dulcie Bellhouse. She also began to write music for the North Shore Symphony Orchestra (founded and conducted by her husband), an association that continued for 25 years. In the 1950s, Holland was commissioned to write musical scores for the

Department of the Interior The United States Department of the Interior (DOI) is an executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the management and conservation of most federal lands and natural resources. It also administers programs relatin ...

, which was then producing a number of documentary films about Australian life for the new wave of migrants entering the country. She eventually wrote the scores for forty of these films. In 1967, Holland joined the

(AMEB) as an examiner. During her long association with the Board, her prolific output of musical studies and pieces for students at all levels of development, along with her authorship of numerous music theory books, were eventually to make her a familiar name in thousands of Australian households. Sales of her didactic writings made her Australia's most celebrated music author. After her retirement from AMEB in 1983, Holland continued to compose, but chose to focus more on the writing of music text books, on the ground that she believed "making new converts to music" to be more important than adding to the volume of existing music. In 1977, she was made a Member of the

Order of Australia The Order of Australia is an Australian honours and awards system, Australian honour that recognises Australian citizens and other persons for outstanding achievement and service. It was established on 14 February 1975 by Elizabeth II, Monarch ...

(AM). In 1993, along with Miriam Hyde, she was awarded an honorary Doctorate of Letters (D.Litt.) by

Macquarie University Macquarie University ( ) is a Public university, public research university in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. Founded in 1964 by the New South Wales Government, it was the third university to be established in the Sydney metropolitan area. ...

Music

Throughout the course of her seventy-year career, Holland produced a considerable body of serious (as opposed to educational) music. Her work includes orchestral pieces (including a symphony), vocal and choral works, a large output of chamber music featuring different combinations of instruments, and many pieces for piano and other solo performance. She wrote in both the contemporary and neo-classical genres.

Style

Dulcie Holland has been described as "less conservative and more appealing than many of her contemporaries". Her music is generally "melodic, optimistic and sunny", and even her darker moods are "reflective and lyrical".Sitsky and Martin, p. 43. She employs "non-traditional key relationships and swiftly changing tonal centres",''Resonate''. and is "fond of the pentatonic scale with its built-in ambiguities, and the possibilities thus given to modulate to unexpected keys". Overall however, her music is said to convey a "sense of balance, of confidence, of individuality ndof formal structure".

Major works

In addition to the symphony and string quartet, Holland's ''Piano Sonata'' has been called "undoubtedly a landmark work in the Australian oeuvre", while her 1944 ''Trio for Violin, Cello and Piano'' has been described as "one of the greatest treasures of Australian music".Australian Music Centre. Reflecting Holland's difficulty in gaining recognition as a serious composer through much of her lifetime, the latter work did not receive its first public performance until 1991, 47 years after it was first written.

Resurgence

The life and music of Holland has seen a recent resurgence of interest. In June 2020, Dr Rita Crews OAM and Dr Jeanell Carrigan AM published the first comprehensive biography of Holland's life, including a complete catalogue of her works (including unpublished works). The release of this biography also coincided with an album of Holland's works, ''In Tribute'', featuring Carrigan at the piano with Goetz Richter AM on violin and Dr Minah Choe on cello. In June 2021, Australian pianist Ronan Apcar released his debut album ''Dulcie Holland Crescent'' following a research project at the

ANU School of Music The ANU School of Music is a school in the Research School of Humanities and the Arts, which forms part of the College of Arts and Social Sciences of the Australian National University. It consists of four buildings, including the main School of ...

. The works on this album included unpublished pieces by Holland and pieces previously not commercially available. The world premiere of Holland's Concertino for piano and strings was given by Apcar and conductor

Leonard Weiss Leonard Weiss is an Australian conductor and educator. He is the 2024-25 Cybec Assistant Conductor with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra and Artistic Director of the Canberra Sinfonia. He is known as a champion of new Australian music, includin ...

, with the Canberra Sinfonia, on 19 June 2022.

Awards

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/ APRA awards, 1933, 1944, 1951, 1955 *

ANZAC The Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) was originally a First World War army corps of the British Empire under the command of the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force. It was formed in Egypt in December 1914, and operated during the ...

Festival Awards, 1954, 1955, 1956 *

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Theatre Award, 1963 *

Henry Lawson Henry Archibald Hertzberg Lawson (17 June 1867 – 2 September 1922) was an Australian writer and bush poet. Along with his contemporary Banjo Paterson, Lawson is among the best-known Australian poets and fiction writers of the colonial period ...

Award, 1965 *Member of the Order of Australia, 1977Bellhouse, Dulcie Sybil
It's an Honour,

Government of Australia The Australian Government, also known as the Commonwealth Government or simply as the federal government, is the national Executive (government), executive government of Australia, a federalism, federal Parliamentary system, parliamentary con ...

database of honours. Retrieved 5 June 2008. *Honorary D.Litt. from Macquarie University, 1993 *AMEB Fellowship in Music, 1994

Footnotes

Recurring references

Dulcie Holland
- Australian Music Centre website.
Dulcie Holland: Building a Foundation
by Rita Crews, ''Resonate'' magazine, 18 April 2008 * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Holland Dulcie Sybil 1913 births 2000 deaths Sydney Conservatorium of Music alumni 20th-century Australian classical composers Australian women classical composers Australian classical composers Australian film score composers Women film score composers Members of the Order of Australia 20th-century women composers 20th-century Australian women