Havelock Nelson (25 May 1917 – 5 August 1996) was an Irish composer and conductor.

Life

Nelson was born in

Cork Cork or CORK may refer to: Materials * Cork (material), an impermeable buoyant plant product ** Cork (plug), a cylindrical or conical object used to seal a container ***Wine cork Places Ireland * Cork (city) ** Metropolitan Cork, also known as G ...

and studied in Dublin with Dina Copeman and Dorothy Stokes at the Royal Irish Academy of Music, organ with George Hewson and composition with

John F. Larchet John Francis Larchet (13 July 1884 – 10 August 1967) was an Irish composer and teacher. He studied at Trinity College Dublin (MusB 1915, MusD 1917), also at the Royal Irish Academy of Music (RIAM) with Michele Esposito. Larchet was music dire ...

.Peter Downey: "Nelson, Havelock", in: ''The Encyclopaedia of Music in Ireland'', ed. by Harry White and Barra Boydell (Dublin: UCD Press, 2013), p. 732–3. He read medical studies and music at Trinity College Dublin (TCD) and followed his first degree with doctoral research in bacteriology, completed in 1941. He was co-founder, in 1939, of the

Dublin Orchestral Players The Dublin Orchestral Players (DOP) is the longest established amateur orchestra in Dublin, Ireland. History In late 1939, Irish composer Havelock Nelson was instrumental in founding the Dublin Junior Orchestra with a view to providing young playe ...

. In 1950 he obtained a doctorate in music from TCD. In 1947, he joined the BBC in Belfast. He conducted the BBC Northern Ireland Orchestra, also the Studio Symphony Orchestra and the Ulster Singers. On his retirement in 1977 he went to Trinidad to direct a local opera company. Nelson died in Belfast.

Music

Nelson's compositions were legion and included orchestral works, a ballet, a choral suite and many partsongs, anthems and (particularly) unison songs, song cycles and other solo songs (like ''Dirty Work'' and ''Love is Cruel''), piano pieces including the ''Three Irish Diversions'', instrumental works like ''Cameos'' for clarinet solo, incidental music for films and radio and TV plays, and many arrangements of Irish and other folksongs. He also made several LP recordings. Among the more popular of his published miniatures are nursery rhymes in the styles of

Mendelssohn Jakob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy (3 February 18094 November 1847), born and widely known as Felix Mendelssohn, was a German composer, pianist, organist and conductor of the early Romantic music, Romantic period. Mendelssohn's compositi ...

and

Rossini Gioachino Antonio Rossini (29 February 1792 – 13 November 1868) was an Italian composer who gained fame for his 39 operas, although he also wrote many songs, some chamber music and piano pieces, and some sacred music. He set new standards f ...

Bibliography

* Havelock Nelson: ''A Bank of Violets. The Musical Memoirs of Havelock Nelson'', foreword by James Galway (Belfast: Greystone Books, 1993), . * Alasdair Jamieson: ''Music in Northern Ireland. Two Major Figures: Havelock Nelson (1917–1996) and Joan Trimble (1915–2000)'' (Tolworth, Surrey: Grosvenor House Publishing, 2017), .

Life

Music

Bibliography

References

External links