Guy Douglas Hamilton Warrack (6 February 1900 – 12 February 1986) was a Scottish

composer A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music. Etymology and def ...

, music educator and

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 ...

. He was the son of John Warrack of the Leith steamship company, John Warrack & Co., founded by Guy's grandfather, also called John.

Life and career

Warrack was born in

Edinburgh Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. The city is located in southeast Scotland and is bounded to the north by the Firth of Forth and to the south by the Pentland Hills. Edinburgh ...

. He was educated at

Cargilfield Preparatory School Cargilfield Preparatory School is a Scottish private co-educational boarding and prep school in Edinburgh, Scotland. History Cargilfield was founded in 1873 by Rev Daniel Charles Darnell an Episcopalian and former master at Rugby School and w ...

and

Winchester College Winchester College is an English Public school (United Kingdom), public school (a long-established fee-charging boarding school for pupils aged 13–18) with some provision for day school, day attendees, in Winchester, Hampshire, England. It wa ...

, where he played organ in chapel services, arranged House choirs and played timpani in the school orchestra.Brook, Donald. ''Conductors' Gallery.'' Rockcliff, Londond 1946, p140-142 Guy Warrack' At

Magdalen College, Oxford Magdalen College ( ) is a Colleges of the University of Oxford, constituent college of the University of Oxford. It was founded in 1458 by Bishop of Winchester William of Waynflete. It is one of the wealthiest Oxford colleges, as of 2022, and ...

he studied music under Sir Hugh Allen and Dr Ernest Walker. During his time as a student, he performed as organist at St Columba's Presbyterian Church in Oxford, as well as in Edinburgh at churches such as St George's United Free. He continued his studies 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 ...

(RCM) where his professors included

Holst Gustav Theodore Holst (born Gustavus Theodore von Holst; 21 September 1874 – 25 May 1934) was an English composer, arranger and teacher. Best known for his orchestral suite ''The Planets'', he composed many other works across a range ...

and

Vaughan Williams Ralph Vaughan Williams ( ; 12 October 1872– 26 August 1958) was an English composer. His works include operas, ballets, chamber music, secular and religious vocal pieces and orchestral compositions including nine symphonies, written over ...

(composing) and

Adrian Boult Sir Adrian Cedric Boult, CH (; 8 April 1889 – 22 February 1983) was a British conductor. Brought up in a prosperous mercantile family, he followed musical studies in England and at Leipzig, Germany, with early conducting work in London ...

(conducting). He won the Foli Prize and the Tagore Gold Medal. During his RCM period he was also active in musical performance, both as conductor and timpanist. From 1925-1935 he taught on the faculty of the

while conducting the Oxford Orchestral Society and their associated children's concerts. He initiated a chamber orchestra series in London (1926-7) through which The Aeolian Chamber Orchestra gave premieres of works by his contemporaries

Constant Lambert Leonard Constant Lambert (23 August 190521 August 1951) was a British composer, conductor, and author. He was the founding music director of the Royal Ballet, and (alongside Dame Ninette de Valois and Sir Frederick Ashton) he was a major figu ...

William Walton Sir William Turner Walton (29 March 19028 March 1983) was an English composer. During a sixty-year career, he wrote music in several classical genres and styles, from film scores to opera. His best-known works include ''Façade'', the cantat ...

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and Gavin Gordon. Warrack also conducted at the

Lyric Hammersmith The Lyric Theatre, also known as the Lyric Hammersmith, is a nonprofit theatre on Lyric Square, off King Street, Hammersmith, London."About the Lyric" > "History" ''Lyric'' official website. Retrieved January 2024. Background The Lyric Theatre ...

and assisted Adrian Boult in an opera season at the

Royal Court Theatre The Royal Court Theatre, at different times known as the Court Theatre, the New Chelsea Theatre, and the Belgravia Theatre, is a West End theatre#London's non-commercial theatres, non-commercial theatre in Sloane Square, London, England, opene ...

. From 1936-1945 he was principal conductor of the

BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra The BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra (BBC SSO) is a Scottish broadcasting symphony orchestra based in Glasgow. One of five full-time orchestras maintained by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), it is the oldest full-time professional rad ...

, leading over 1,500 broadcasts by them and giving European premieres of works by

Aaron Copland Aaron Copland (, ; November 14, 1900December 2, 1990) was an American composer, critic, writer, teacher, pianist, and conductor of his own and other American music. Copland was referred to by his peers and critics as the "Dean of American Compos ...

George Frederick McKay George Frederick McKay (June 11, 1899 – October 4, 1970) was a prolific modern American composer. Biography McKay was born in the small frontier wheat farming town of Harrington, Washington. His family later moved to Spokane, where he atte ...

and Daniel Gregory Mason, as well as reviving neglected repertoire.Obituary, ''The Musical Times'', Vol. 127, No. 1718 (May 1986), p. 291
/ref> He orchestrated the piano music of Fauré for choreographer Andrée Howard's best known ballet, ''La Fête étrange'', premiered on 23 May 1940.

York Bowen Edwin York Bowen (22 February 1884 – 23 November 1961) was an English composer and pianist. Bowen's musical career spanned more than fifty years during which time he wrote over 160 works. As well as being a pianist and composer, Bowen was a tal ...

wrote his ''Miniature Suite'', Op.113 for Warrack and the winds of the BBC Scottish Orchestra in 1944. Warrack also conducted many orchestras in London and the rest of the UK. From 1948-1951 he joined the Sadler's Wells Theatre Ballet where he conducted the premieres of Andrée Howard's ''Selina'' (1948),

Richard Arnell Richard Anthony Sayer Arnell (15 September 191710 April 2009) was an English composer of classical music. Arnell composed in all the established genres for the concert stage, and his list of works includes six completed symphonies (a seventh wa ...

and

John Cranko John Cyril Cranko (15 August 1927 – 26 June 1973) was a South African ballet dancer and choreographer with the Royal Ballet and the Stuttgart Ballet. Life and career Early life Cranko was born to Herbert and Grace Cranko in Rustenburg in ...

's ''Harlequin in April'' (1951), and other works. In his commitment to contemporary British music, and in his capacity of Chair of the Composers' Guild, Warrack wrote to the

London Symphony Orchestra The London Symphony Orchestra (LSO) is a British symphony orchestra based in London. Founded in 1904, the LSO is the oldest of London's orchestras, symphony orchestras. The LSO was created by a group of players who left Henry Wood's Queen's ...

in 1952 acknowledging their "shining example" in this area, and bemoaning the lack of interest in other UK musical organizations. Warrack's other interests were wide. He was an accomplished mathematician, and the author of ''Sherlock Holmes and Music'' (Faber & Faber 1947) and ''Royal College of Music, the first eighty-five years, 1883-1968 and beyond'' (RCM, 1977).

Composer

Warrack is best remembered for the music he composed for documentary films after the war, many of them for the

Crown Film Unit The Crown Film Unit was an organisation within the British Government's Ministry of Information during the Second World War; until 1940, it was the GPO Film Unit. Its remit was to make films for the general public in Britain and abroad. Its outp ...

. His first was ''The Last Shot'' (1945), which was followed by '' A Defeated People'' (1946), '' Theirs is the Glory'' (1946), ''Here is the Gold Coast'' (1947), '' XIVTH Olympiad - The Glory of Sport'' (1948), ''Down to the Sea'' (1948), ''The Story of Time'' (a film produced by Signal Films for Rolex Watches, 1951), '' A Queen is Crowned'' (1953) and ''The Sky is Ours'' (1956). Of his music for ''A Defeated People'', portraying the shattered state of Germany in the immediate aftermath of World War II,

Muir Mathieson James Muir Mathieson, OBE (24 January 19112 August 1975) was a British musician whose career was spent mainly as the musical director for British film studios. Born in Scotland, to a musical family, Mathieson won a scholarship to the Royal Co ...

wrote: As a composer of concert music, Warrack has been entirely forgotten. His ''Variations for Orchestra'' was included by

Donald Tovey Sir Donald Francis Tovey (17 July 187510 July 1940) was a British musical analyst, musicologist, writer on music, composer, conductor and pianist. He had been best known for his '' Essays in Musical Analysis'' and his editions of works by Bac ...

in the Edinburgh Reid Concerts of 1931. The now lost "Edinburgh" Symphony was performed on Friday 1 April 1932 at the Royal College of Music (where he was teaching), conducted by

Malcolm Sargent Sir Harold Malcolm Watts Sargent (29 April 1895 – 3 October 1967) was an English conductor, organist and composer widely regarded as Britain's leading conductor of choral works. The musical ensembles with which he was associated include ...

. It was broadcast by the BBC on 27 December 1936. The brief ''Hornpipe (for a Sailor Prince)'' for cello, trumpet and piano, based on the notes CHAS, was composed for H. R. H. Prince Charles in 1970 and has been recorded.

Compositions

* ''Variations for Orchestra'' (1924) * ''Lullaby'' for horn and orchestra (1929) * ''Wellington Square'' (1931, hymn tune) * Symphony in C minor (1932) * ''Divertimento Pasticciato'' for orchestra (1939) (in three movements: 'Prelude', 'Fugue' and 'Furiant') (pub. Boosey & Hawkes) * 'Men of Arnhem' (1946 - march from ''Theirs is the Glory'') * 'Miniature Rhapsody' (1946 - extracted from his film score ''The Last Shot'') * ''Marathon Fugue'' for orchestra (1948 - extracted from his film score ''The Glory of Sport'') * ''Andante, Theme and Variations'' for cello and orchestra (pub. Boosey & Hawkes) * ''Don Quixote'', ballet * ''Fugal Blues'' * ''Jota'' for piano duet (arranged from ''Don Quixote'') * ''Songs of Burns'' * ''Te Deum'' * Waltzes - ''Das Strassmädchen'' and ''Der Mandelbaum'', for piano duet

Personal life

His first marriage was to Jacynth Ellerton in 1926. Their two children were

John Warrack John Hamilton Warrack (born 9 February 1928) is an English music critic, writer on music, and oboist. Career Born in London, Warrack is the son of Scottish conductor and composer Guy Warrack and Jacynth Mary Ellerton. He was educated at Winches ...

the music writer and critic, and Julia Mary. His second marriage was to Valentine Jeffery, who had trained as a dancer under

Ninette de Valois Dame Ninette de Valois (born Edris Stannus; 6 June 1898 – 8 March 2001) was an Irish-born British dancer, teacher, choreographer, and director of classical ballet. Most notably, she danced professionally with Serge Diaghilev's Ballets Russ ...

. Their two children were Nigel (a film director, died 2016) and Giles. In the 1940s their address was Cranbourne, Fairmile Lane, Cobham in Surrey. During the 1950s and 1960s they were living at 2 Campden House Terrace in Kensington. Warrack remained active until his early eighties, at the

Performing Right Society PRS for Music Limited (formerly The MCPS-PRS Alliance Limited) is a British music copyright collective, made up of two collection societies: the Mechanical-Copyright Protection Society (MCPS) and the Performing Right Society (PRS). It undertakes ...

and Composers' Guild, and as a travelling examiner for the Associated Board. He died, aged 86, at

Englefield Green Englefield Green is a large village in the Borough of Runnymede, Surrey, England, approximately west of central London. It is home to Runnymede Meadow, The Commonwealth Air Forces Memorial, The Savill Garden,and Royal Holloway, University of L ...

.Obituary, ''The Times'', 14 February 1986, p 18

References

External links

*
''A Defeated People'', YouTube
{{DEFAULTSORT:Warrack, Guy 1900 births 1986 deaths People educated at Cargilfield School People educated at Winchester College Academics of the Royal College of Music Scottish composers Scottish conductors (music) British male conductors (music) Ballet conductors 20th-century British conductors (music) 20th-century British composers 20th-century Scottish musicians 20th-century Scottish male musicians Chief conductors of the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra