Jack Ellitt (20 May 1902 – 2001) was a British filmmaker, composer and musician. He was born Avrom Yitzhak Elitski to an orthodox Jewish Lithuanian family in Manchester and raised in Sydney from the age of 3.

Career

Ellitt's career began with the New South Wales State Conservatorium of Music where he studied piano and violin and played bassoon in the conservatorium's orchestra. In the early 1920s, Ellitt became friends with the New Zealand-born artist

Len Lye Leonard Charles Huia Lye (; 5 July 1901 – 15 May 1980) was a New Zealand artist known primarily for his experimental films and kinetic sculpture. His films are held in archives including the New Zealand Film Archive, British Film Institute, ...

, then resident in Sydney. Lye left Sydney for London in 1926 and Ellitt followed in 1927, settling into the same Hammersmith artistic circle as Lye. Through

A. P. Herbert Sir Alan Patrick Herbert CH (known as A. P. Herbert; 24 September 1890 – 11 November 1971), was an English humorist, novelist, playwright, law reformist, and, from 1935 to 1950, an independent Member of Parliament for Oxford University. Bo ...

, Lye had obtained a job as stage hand at the Lyric Theatre and Ellitt took over this role upon his arrival in London while Lye dedicated more time to his practice. Ellitt and Lye worked in collaboration through the next decade, with Ellitt serving as sound editor or composer on many of Lye's experimental short films. The first of these was Lye's debut film, ''Tusalava'' (1929), produced with support from the London Film Society. Ellitt composed a live, two-piano score for the 7-minute film. ''Tusalava's'' debut screening happened on 1 December 1929 at the New Gallery Cinema. Unhappy with the film society providing only one piano, Ellitt refused to participate as a pianist, leaving the other pianist to perform alone. He destroyed records of the score, rendering the film silent to this day. Lye later suggested Eugene Goossen's ''Rhythmic Dance. op. 30'' could be a suitable approximation for what Ellitt had produced for the film. Ellitt collaborated with

Oswell Blakeston Oswell Blakeston was the pseudonym of Henry Joseph Hasslacher (1907–1985), a British writer and artist who also worked in the film industry, made some experimental films, and wrote extensively on film theory. He was also a poet and wrote in non- ...

and

Francis Bruguière Francis Joseph Bruguière (15 October 1879 – 8 May 1945) was an American photographer. Biography Francis Bruguière was born in San Francisco, California, to Emile Antoine Bruguière (1849–1900) and Josephine Frederikke (Sather) Bruguièr ...

on the film ''Light Rhythms'' (1931), composing the live piano score. Further projects with Len Lye came in the 1930s with Ellitt contributing sound editing to all of Lye's

GPO Film Unit The GPO Film Unit was a subdivision of the UK General Post Office. The unit was established in 1933, taking on responsibilities of the Empire Marketing Board Film Unit. Headed by John Grierson, it was set up to produce sponsored documentary film ...

productions alongside ''Full Fathom Five (1935), Kaleidoscope'' (1935) ''and Birth of the Robot'' (1936). During the production of the GPO's ''N or NW?'' (1937) the relationship between Ellitt and Lye soured and the two parted ways with Ellitt taking the role of chief editor at Strand Film Company, a production house specialising in documentary films. In 1942, Ellitt directed the ICI-sponsored Technicolor documentary, ''This Is Colour'', alongside

Jack Cardiff Jack Cardiff (18 September 1914 – 22 April 2009) was a British cinematographer, film and television director, and photographer. His career spanned the development of cinema, from silent film, through early experiments in Technicolor, to film ...

and

Basil Wright Basil Charles Wright (12 June 1907 – 14 October 1987) was an English documentary filmmaker, film historian, film critic and teacher. Biography Basil Wright was born in Sutton, Surrey in 1907. After leaving Sherborne School, a well known i ...

. Ellitt subsequently worked on hundreds of films for Strand and other companies while based in Sussex with his wife, Doris Harrison (previously a nanny working for

Robert Graves Captain Robert von Ranke Graves (24 July 1895 – 7 December 1985) was an English poet, soldier, historical novelist and critic. His father was Alfred Perceval Graves, a celebrated Irish poet and figure in the Gaelic revival; they were b ...

). He returned with Doris to Australia in the 1970s, living in

Kincumber Kincumber is a south-eastern suburb of the Central Coast region of New South Wales, Australia, nested between the Kincumba Mountain Reserve and the Kincumber Broadwater and located north of Sydney via the Sydney–Newcastle Freeway (M1). It i ...

. Ellitt died in 2001.

Compositions

Ellitt's work as a composer involved techniques such as drawn sound and

musique concrète Musique concrète (; ): " problem for any translator of an academic work in French is that the language is relatively abstract and theoretical compared to English; one might even say that the mode of thinking itself tends to be more schematic ...

. In 1935 Ellitt outlined his musical practice in an essay called in ''On Sound'' published in ''

Life and Letters Life, also known as biota, refers to matter that has biological processes, such as signaling and self-sustaining processes. It is defined descriptively by the capacity for homeostasis, organisation, metabolism, growth, adaptation, response ...

'', expressing a desire to "free our ears (from) tight-laced musical values" and anticipating future sound art practices where "good recording apparatus is easily acquired, many people will record simple everyday sounds which give them pleasure. The next step would be to mould these sound-snaps into formal continuity". Ellitt employed the term "Sound Construction" for his recordings. Few of Ellitt's musical compositions are extant today, limiting a fuller perspective on his innovations in the field. It is possible Ellitt destroyed much of his work later in life, leaving just a handful of pieces for reference. All extant works by Ellitt have been published in Australia by Shame File Music.

''Light Rhythms''

The score for the live piano accompaniment to Blakeston and Bruguière's film ''Light Rhythms'' was published in ''Cantrill's Film Notes'' and a new synchronisation of the score with the film published in Bruce Posner and David Shepard's ''Unseen Cinema: Early American Avant-Garde Film 1894-1941'' DVD set (2005).

Journey #1

A recording demonstrating Ellitt's ideas from his 'On Sound' essay and the use of musical, concrete and synthetic sounds. The pieces is identified by Len Lye biographer Roger Horrocks as a piece of soundtrack for an unfinished film collaboration between Lye, Basil Taylor,

John Aldridge John William Aldridge (born 18 September 1958) is a former footballer and manager. Nicknamed "Aldo", he was a prolific, record-breaking striker. His tally of 329 Football League goals is the sixth-highest in the history of English football. ...

, Eustace Lewis, Norman Cobb and Ellitt called ''Quicksilver'' (1930-1934). A vinyl recording pressed in 1954 is archived in the National Film and Sound Archives of Australia.

Homage to Rachel Carson (part 2)

The second of two recordings inspired by the ecological writings of

Rachel Carson Rachel Louise Carson (May 27, 1907 – April 14, 1964) was an American marine biologist, writer, and conservation movement, conservationist whose sea trilogy (1941–1955) and book ''Silent Spring'' (1962) are credited with advancing mari ...

, this 1987 piece narrates the life of Len Lye with spoken word by Ellitt interspersed with sound construction passages.

Filmography

* Scotland Speaks (1941) * This Is Colour (1942) * Chasing the Blues (1946) * Education of the Deaf (1946)

Recordings

* Jack Ellitt ''Sound Constructions'', Shame File Music, 2011 * Various ''Artists Artefacts of Australian Experimental Music: 1930 – 1973'', Shame File Music, 2007

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ellitt, Jack 1902 births 2001 deaths British filmmakers British classical composers British classical pianists