James G. Mansell, Musical Modernity and Contested Commemoration at The Festival of Remembrance, 1923-1927, The Historical Review, Vol. 52, No. 2, June 2009, Pp. 433-454.

Musical Modernity and Contested Commemoration at the Festival of Remembrance, 1923-1927
Author(s): James G. Mansell

Source: The Historical Journal, Vol. 52, No. 2 (Jun., 2009), pp. 433-454
Published by: Cambridge University Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40264178
Accessed: 24-07-2015 14:38 UTC
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/
info/about/policies/terms.jsp
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content
in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship.
For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.
Cambridge University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The Historical Journal.
http://www.jstor.org
This content downloaded from 194.177.218.24 on Fri, 24 Jul 2015 14:38:02 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
TheHistoricalJournal,52, 2 (2009),pp. 433-454 CambridgeUniversityPress2009
doi:io.ioi7/Sooi8246Xo9OO7535 Printedin the United Kingdom
MUSICAL MODERNITY AND

CONTESTED COMMEMORATION
AT THE FESTIVAL OF REMEMBRANCE,
1923-1927*
JAMES G. MANSELL
Universityof Manchester
abstract. musicinto thehistoryof war commemoration

This articlemakesthecasefor incorporating
in IQ20SBritainby examining John Foulds's A World Requiem, performed at theBritishLegion'sfirst
Festivalsof Remembrance at theRoyalAlbertHall betweenig2j and ig26. A simultaneously modernist
and spiritualwork,Foulds'sRequiem challenges Jay Winter'sconclusionthat modernismwas uncon-
cernedwithpublicgrief The controversy which the Requiem causedalso revealsthe contestednatureof
public memory,particularlywheremusk and religionwere concerned.The Requiem'^ axing in ig2j
points to a hegemonicprocesswhich,althoughit hadyet fully to takeshape,found no roomon Armistice
Nightfor Foulds's
progressive ideals.
Despite the ongoing attentiondevoted to the culturalimpact of the Great War,

almostnothinghas been writtenaboutA WorldRequiem byJohn Foulds.1Subtitled
'A Cenotaph in Sound', it was performedon four consecutiveArmisticeNights
between 1923and 1926as the centrepieceof the BritishLegion'soriginalFestival
of Remembrance.Had it enteredthe musicalcanon, the workwould surelyhave
featured in historians'debate about modernity and memory. Its appeal to the
spiritualunity of mankind could have supportedJay Winter's claim that the
culturalforms summoned in response to the war were not as straightforwardly
School of Arts, Histories and Cultures,Universityof Manchester,OxfordRoad, Manchester,M13 gPLJames.

mansell@manchester.ac.uk
* The author is gratefulto BertrandTaithe and Penelope Gouk who supervisedthe thesis from
which this articleis drawnand to the Arts and HumanitiesResearchCouncilfor its financialsupport.
My thanksalso to LucindaMatthews-Joneswho read and commentedon the draftcopy and toJayne
Harriswho suppliedinvaluableprimarysourcematerial.
1 Glen thenight:musicandtheGreatWar(Berkeley,2003),containsonly a brief
Watkins,Proofthrough
reference.The only scholarlywork to considerFoulds at length is Malcolm MacDonald,JohnFoulds
(New York,NY, 1989).See alsoJames G. Mansell,'Music and the borders
andhismusic:an introduction
of rationality: discourses of place in the work of John Foulds', in Grace E. Brockington,d.,
and the arts in Britain and Europeat thefin de sicle(Oxford, forthcoming), and Bob van der
Internationalism
Linden, 'Music, theosophicalspirituality,and empire: the BritishmodernistcomposersCyril Scott
andJohn Foulds',Journalof GlobalHistory,3 (2008),pp. 163-82.
433
434 JAMES G.MANSELL
'modern' as Paul Fussell made out.2 Yet Foulds's tribute to the war-dead of
all nations did not simply fade from view. It was deliberatelysuppressedand
writtenout of historyby those who objectedto the very intentionsthat now mark
it out for special attention.When the DailyExpresstook over the runningof the
Festival of Remembrance in 1927, replacing Foulds's internationalistrequiem
with patriotic singing, the British Legion distanced itself so completely from
the original format that historianshave subsequentlyfound little record of its
existence.3
The workwas composedduringand immediatelyafterthe war to a text drawn
from the Bible, Bunyan's Pilgrim's progress,and the works of the Hindu poet,
Kabir.4This eclectic mix was the product of Foulds'sinvolvement,along with
many other early twentieth-centurythinkers,with the alternativespiritualmove-
ment of Theosophy. Althoughmovementssuch as Theosophy firstemergedas a
reactionto the 'materialist'rationalismof the late Victorianperiod, a numberof
historians have pointed to their continuing relevance and popularity in the
interwaryears as means of coping with the emotional legacy of the conflict.5
Winter,for example,takesthem as evidenceof continuitybetweenpre- and post-
FirstWorldWar culture,aimingto show that a ' traditionalvocabularyof mourn-
ing', rather than modernistirony, was predominantin commemorationof the
war.6The Theosophy evident in A WorldRequierrCs spiritualmessage of peace is
certainlysuggestiveof such culturalcontinuity,but on the other hand, the work
was described by leading Catholic magazine, The Tablet,as 'tremendously
modern' in its use of 'unrelatedchords', ' quarter-tones',and 'syntheticmelody',
techniques that Foulds adopted as self-consciouslymodernist gestures.7In this
respect, Winter's argument that modernist art could not offer healing to a
traumatizedpublic does not fit the bill.
Foulds imagined a war requiem that was simultaneouslymodernistand spiri-
tuallycathartic.The idea of fashioninga cenotaphin sound,an emptytomb from
the physicalvibrationsof music, drewupon an ancientocculttraditionrevivedby
Theosophy in which music, above all other forms of human expression,was
thought to connect mankindwith the naturalworkingsand divine inspirationof
the universe.Understandingthis 'speculative' traditionof music theory, shown
by Joscelyn Godwin and Penelope Gouk to have featured in various cultural
contexts from antiquityto modernity,requiresus to think beyond our familiar
2
Jay Winter, Sites of memory,sites of mourning:the Great War in Europeanculturalhistory(Cambridge,
1995); Paul Fussell, The Great War and modernmemory(Oxford, 1975). See also Modris Eksteins, Rites of
spring:theGreatWarand thebirthof themodemage(London, 1989), and Trudi Tate, Modernism,historyand the
First World War (Manchester, 1998).
3 A World
Requiemfeatures only as a footnote, for example, in Adrian Gregory's otherwise com-
prehensive The silenceof memory:ArmisticeDay, igig-ig46 (Oxford, 1994).
4 The
original composer's score is held by the British Library, Additional Manuscript (hereafter BL)
56478.
5
Jenny Hazelgrove, 'Spiritualism after the Great War', Twentieth-Century British History, 10 (1999),
pp. 404-30; Jenny Hazelgrove, Spiritualismand Britishsocietybetweenthe wars (Manchester, 2000).
6 7 The
Winter, Sites of memory,p. 223. Tablet,21 Nov. 1925.
MUSICAL MODERNITY 435
assumptionsabout music.8For Foulds and many other Britishcomposersinflu-
enced by Theosophy, music was not simply an art form or a mode of represen-
tation, but an objective physical phenomenon with an active occult agency in
social, psychological,and spirituallife.9Foulds consideredmoderniststyle to be
an extension of Theosophy's quest to experiment in this occult science.10So,
althoughWinterwas correct to identifyTheosophy as a conduit throughwhich
'older romantic, religious, and spiritualistmotifs' were revived, its spiritual
model, far from being irreconcilablewith modernism, was often assimilated
into experimentalaesthetics. Unfamiliar representationalforms were, in turn,
embraced by Theosophy as symbols of a world yet to be realized, a world in
which 'the religionof unity' could be formed.11
This strandof musicalmodernityhas been all but forgottenby historiansand
musicologists.This articledemonstratesthat Theosophy had a wide currencyin
the intellectual life of early twentieth-centuryBritain and that, particularly
throughthe medium of music, it played a significantpart in the culturalconflict
over the commemorationof Armistice Night in the 1920s. An excavation of
Foulds'slost 'Cenotaph in Sound' providesa timelycase studygiven the growing
interest in auditory aspects of the past.12Historiographyon the modernity of
commemorationhas focusedoverwhelminglyon the material,visual,and literary
8
Joscelyn Godwin, 'The revival of speculative music', Musical Quarterly,68 (1982), pp. 373-89;
Joscelyn Godwin, Harmoniesof heavenand earth:thespiritualdimensionof musicfrom antiquityto theavant-garde
(London, 1987);Joscelyn Godwin, Music and the occult:Frenchmusicalphilosophies,1730-ig^o (Rochester,
NY, 1995) ; Penelope Gouk, Music, scienceand naturalmagicin seventeenth-centuryEngland(New Haven, CT,
1999); Penelope Gouk, 'Raising spirits and restoring souls: early modern medical explanations for
music's effects', in Veit Erlmann, d., Hearing cultures:essays on sound, listeningand modernity(Oxford,
2004), pp. 87-105.
9 Others included Gustav '
Hoist, Peter Warlock, and Cyril Scott. See Diana Swann, Gentlemen
versus players: alienation and the esoteric in English music, 1900-1939 (Ph.D. thesis, Southampton,
998).
10 The
'modernity' of occult revival is insisted upon by Thomas Laqueur, 'Why the margins
matter: occultism and the making of modernity', ModernIntellectualHistory, 3 (2006), pp. 111-35, and
Corinna Treitel, A sciencefor thesoul: occultismand thegenesisof the Germanmodern(Baltimore, MD, 2004).
See also Michael Saler, 'Modernity and enchantment: a historiographie review', AmericanHistorical
Review, m (2006), pp. 692-716.
11 This
point is made by Tim Armstrong in Modernism: a culturalhistory(Cambridge, 2005), p. 68 ; See
also Tom H. Gibbons, 'Cubism and "the fourth dimension" in the context of the late nineteenth-
century and early twentieth-century revival of occult idealism', Journal of the Warburgand CourtauM
-
Institutes,44 (1981), pp. 130-47; Raymond Head, 'Hoist astrology and modernism in "The Planets" ',
Tempo,187 (1993), pp. 15-22; Linda Dalrymple Henderson, 'Mysticism and occultism in modern art',
Art Journal, 46 (1987), pp. 5-8; Sixten Ringbom, 'Art in "the epoch of the great spiritual": occult
elements in the early theory of abstract painting', Journal of the Warburgand CourtauldInstitutes,29 (1966),
pp. 386-418.
12 Karin
culture,andpublicproblemsof noisein thetwentieth-century
Bijsterveld, Mechanicalsound:technology,
(Cambridge, MA, 2008); John M. Picker, Victoriansoundscapes(Oxford, 2003); Mark M. Smith, d.,
Hearing history:a reader(Athens, GA, 2004); Jonathan Sterne, The audiblepast: culturalorigjnsof sound
(Durham, NC, 2003).
reproduction
436 JAMES G.MANSELL
culturesof memory13and despitetheirtraditionalwarinessof dealingwith musical
form, historianshave much to gain from embracingmusic as a meaningfulagent
in the social world. Music offersperspectiveson the politics of nationality,sub-
jectivity, and spiritualitythat are essentialto understandingthe contestednature
of Britain'scultureof commemoration.A World esotericismprovedto be
Requiem's
both unpalatable and unintelligibleto those who wielded cultural authority.
Music criticsthoughtit musically'empty3and presumptuousin its religiosityand
the BritishBroadcastingCorporation,which had begun regularmusicbroadcasts
in 1922,could not categorizeits idiosyncraticstyle and refusedto legitimizeit as
'serious' music.
To makemattersworsefor Foulds,the Festivalof Remembrancewhich he had
establishedat his own expense (a 1926 flyer for which is shown in Figure 1)was
caught in a national debate about the proper musical commemoration of
ArmisticeNight in which religious solemnity and secular celebrationcame to
loggerheads.After the Requiem's abruptand unexplainedaxing in 1927,Foulds's
wife and close collaborator,Maud MacCarthy,was left convincedof a high-level
conspiracyagainst them involvingthe BritishLegion, the DailyExpress,and the
BBC.14The mysteryof this axing returnedto public attentionin 2007 when, as
part of a wider rediscoveryof Foulds's music, the BBC Symphony Orchestra
announcedthat it would performthe workfor the firsttime since 1926.Journalists
ponderedwhy it had disappearedso completelyin the firstplace.15The answerto
their question,presentedhere for the first time, offersa unique insight into the
politicsof musicalmodernityand a freshperspectiveon the culturallegacy of the
FirstWorldWar.
I
The idea of composinga requiemfor the mass commemorationof the war came
to Fouldswhilstdoing his officiallyallocatedwork,performingin Giro'sClub for
servicemenand directingthe musical activitiesof the Central London YMCA.
Severalyears before the war he had met Maud MacCarthy,once a well-known
concert violinist,but now a disciple of Annie Besant, social reformerand presi-
dent of the Theosophical Society.16Founded in 1875by Helena Blavatskyand
Henry Olcott, Theosophy drew on the traditionsof Buddhism and Hinduism
13 Alex
King, Memorialsof the Great War in Britain: the symbolismand politics of remembrance(Oxford,
1998); Catherine Moriarty, 'The material culture of Great War remembrance ', Journal of Contemporary
History,34 (1999), pp. 653-62.
14 This is revealed in
MacCarthy's correspondence with the BBC Music Department held in the
BBC Written Archive Centre (hereafter BBC) Tohn Foulds Files.
16
Independent,7 Nov. 2007; see also New Statesman.25 Dec. 2001.
16 She
published prolifically over her life using a variety of names: Maud McCarthy, The templeof
labour:four lectureson theplan beautifulin relationto modemindustrialism(London, 1926); Swami Omananda
Puri, The boy and the brothers(London, 1968); Swami Omananda Puri, Towardsthe mysteries:beingsome
'
teachingsof the Brothersof the Holy Hierarchy,given through The boy' (London, 1968); Tandra Devi, Poems
(Tandrashram, Srinagar, and Kashmir, 1939).
Fig. 1. Promotional flyer from the 1926 Festival of Remembrance, BL 56478.
438 JAMES G.MANSELL
and pointed to the unity of these Eastern religionswith Western Christianity.
Realizationof such culturalunity,Theosophershoped, would lead to a 'universal
brotherhoodof humanity'.17The pursuitof esoterictraditionand occult knowl-
edge which accompanied this geopolitical stance was part of a broader 'flight
from reason' that had gathered pace in British culture since the 1880s.18As
personal friends of the architectEdwin Lutyens, designer of Whitehall'siconic
cenotaph, and his wife Emily, a senior figurein EnglishTheosophy, Foulds and
MacCarthywere part of an esoteric network in which commemorationof the
war-deadand the call for internationalpeace were urgent spiritualissues.19
The combinationof Foulds'scommunityworkwith MacCarthy'sknowledgeof
practicaloccultismsparkedthe idea for an annual Festivalof Remembranceat
which music could be used to unite and heal. Annie Besant's 1908 lecture on
'Religion and music' revealswhy music in particularwas essentialto this cause.
'Why does music exercise so great an influence over the passions and the
emotionsof man?' she askedher audience.'Why is it that religionhas ever found
in music one of its strongesthelpers, one of its most inspiringagencies?' For
answersshe turnedto the birth of the Hebrew race; 'the birthplacealso of these
strangesequencesof musicalnotes that producethe most extraordinaryresultson
the physical bodies of the hearers'.20Following Pythagoras(who believed that
planetarymotion had its only earthly equivalent in musical vibration),Besant
identifiedthe physicalvibrationof certain sound waves as key to the mysterious
power of music. Musicalvibrations,she argued,impact upon the 'subtle body',
that is, the part of the human body 'finer than physical matter'. This subtle
body responds to 'subtle matter' which includes 'the waves caused by the
vibrationsthat are musical notes'. The change in vibrationwhich music causes
in the subtle body brings about a simultaneouschange in consciousness.'As
vibrationsof matterand changesin consciousnesscorrespond',explainedBesant,
'the vibrationsof the subtle matter are answeredby changes in the embodied
consciousness,and the hearerfeels the passions,the emotions,representedby the
music.'21
Foulds's familiaritywith this theory is evident in his suggestion that 'We
incline to forget that music is a force in Nature as is Light, or Heat, or
17 H. P.
Blavatsky, Thekeyto Theosophy : beinga clearexposition,in theform of questionand answer,of theethics,
scienceand philosophyfor the study of which the TheosophicalSocietyhas beenfounded (London, 1889); Henry
Olcott, Theosophy,religionand occultscience(London, 1885).
18 Mark S.
Morrisson, 'The periodical culture of the occult revival: esoteric wisdom, modernity and
counter-public spheres', Journal of ModernLiterature,31 (2008), pp. 1-22; Alex Owen, The place of en-
chantment:Britishoccultismand thecultureof themodern(Chicago, IL, 2004) ;Joscelyn Godwin, The theosophical
enlightenment(Albany, NY, 1QQ4);Tames Webb, Theflightfromreason(London, 1071).
19
Historiography on the theosophical movement has emphasized its particular appeal to women
such as Besant, MacCarthy, and Emily Lutyens. See Joy Dixon, Divinefeminine: Theosophyandfeminismin
England(Baltimore, MD, 2001).
20 Annie
Besant, Religionand musk: a lecturedeliveredto the Shri ParihasarathiSvami Sabha, Triplicaneon
March ytii igo8 (Madras, 1921), p. 4. 21
Ibid., pp. 13-14.
22 His Sanskrit
Electricity. opera Avatara(1930) was an attempt to demonstrate
music's occult power. Each overture, or 'mantra' as he described them, was
intended to 'set in motion the basic vibration-type of the whole act', each one of
which raised the listener to new regions of consciousness. Each type of vibration,
associated with a particular musical scale or mode, corresponded to a state of
consciousness, from mental, to intuitional, to spiritual, and finally to full con-
sciousness of the divine.23 This spiritual-psychological effect of music, according
to MacCarthy, is achieved by composers who 'catch the deeper harmonies of
the cosmogonie order'.24 In addition to its effects on consciousness, musical vi-
brations were also thought to benefit the physical health of the hearer. The
medicinal properties of 'magical sound' had always interested MacCarthy, and
there is no doubt that she hoped A WorldRequiemwould soothe both the mental
and physical pain of the war. She later wrote that
A widespreadpracticingacquaintancewith the lovely Sound-Mysterycould liberate im-

mense forcesfor the healingof the nations.Thus, for instance,we may permitourselvesto
-
imagine accuratereproductionsof the sounds made by celestialchoirs which are most
on - and re-creatingmillionsthroughradio, and in otherways,
healing any plane reaching
and bestowingnew leases of life on all who would trulyhearken.26
The 'Cenotaph in Sound' subtitle of the Requiemwas certainly no gimmick.

Given prominence on the front cover of the Festival of Remembrance concert
programme in 1923 (Figure 2), it referred to Theosophy's belief that musical
sound could alter the physical and spiritual state of the listener. The need to
create a sonic war memorial whose effects would bring healing and spiritual
uplifting to the masses was lent greater urgency by the damage thought to have
been caused by the war's fearful soundscape. Besant wrote of the need to make
the human body 'impervious to the jangling noises of earth' and Cyril Scott,
another British composer influenced by Theosophy, lamented that upon their
return from the trenches, British soldiers were greeted by noises of a newly
mechanized urban modernity: 'The jarring sounds of motor-horns, whistles,
grinding brakes and so forth exercise a cumulative and deleterious effect upon the
entire organism. In order to counteract this', he explained, 'certain composers
will be used to evolve a type of music calculated to heal where these discordant
noises have destroyed'.26
22 From a talk
given by John Foulds broadcast on All-India Radio, Delhi Station, 6 Mar. 1937,
entitled 'Is the gulf between Eastern and Western music unbridgeable?', quoted in MacDonald, John
Foulds, frontispiece.
28
from thepast, and legacyto thejuture(London, 1934), p. 177.
John Foulds, Music to-day:its heritage
24 Maud
MacCarthy, 'True art: letter to a young painter', The Theosophist,30 (1908), p. 204.
25
Puri, Towardsthemysteries,p. 20.
26
Besant, Religion and music, p. 20; Cyril Scott, Music, its secretinfluencethroughoutthe ages [1933],
reproduced in Joscelyn Godwin, d., Music, mysticismand magic: a sourcebook(New York, NY, 1987),
p. 285.
44O JAMES G.MANSELL
Fig. 2. Front cover of the 1923Festivalof Remembranceconcertprogramme,BL 56478.
The imperativeto protect and disseminatethe sonicallybeautifulwas crucial

to the conceptionof the Requiem.MacCarthy'spencil annotationson the original
composer's score reveal much about this mystical process. Parts of the music
came to Fouldsclairaudiently,or, as MacCarthyput it, ' in a psychicallyobjective
way'. One passageof music, she recalled,
washeardby me, as it wereenfoldingourentirehouse.I wasat the topof the house,and
Johnwasin hisstudytwofloorsbelow.I wentdownto tellhim,andfoundhimwritingthe
samepassagesin the same keys.Sometimesthe house seemedto be shakenby thisheavenly
music, and angelicchoirs sang, and angelic musiciansplayed to us.27
Independent corroboration of this is to be found in the memoirs of Elisabeth

Lutyens, daughter of Edwin and Emily, who received music lessons from Foulds.
She recalled that 'Foulds and a group of fellow-Theosophists were trying to make
contact with the Devas [Hindu Gods] or angels and to receive messages or music
from them. This was to be achieved by meditation of an undefined sort in the
'28
attempt to render oneself psychic. MacCarthy's annotations also reveal that
the occult fiction writer Algernon Blackwood visited their home whilst this clair-
audience was taking place. His 1921book Thebrightmessenger was, according to her,
'an account, in the main, of what he found at our house'.29
As so often with Theosophy, the mystical element of clairaudience was
balanced by an appeal to occult science. The physicality of sound waves had been
popularized through the work of German physicist, Hermann von Helmholtz,
who was among the first to measure the resonance produced by music. His book
On the sensations of tone as a physiological basisfor the theoryof music (1863) was cited by
Foulds as an example of how previously occult knowledge about music gradually
became widely acknowledged scientific fact.30 If the world is full of vibrating
sounds, then it seemed reasonable to Foulds that these sounds sometimes align
themselves in such a way as to provide access to the sounds of the cosmos. This
realization had proved crucial to him in 1915:
Whilst retiringI heard a very fine subtle [sic] melody which seemed to expand my con-
sciousnessenormously.It easily included all sounds which I would otherwisehave con-
sideredas accidentalnoises: childrenat play, locomotivewhistling,churchbell, workmen
crackingwood in basement,railwaysound 'puff, puff', dog barking,the regularand very
-
slight creak of the mattressspring caused by my heart-beats,even a motor hooting all
these mere noises seemedto be perfectlyin place as harmoniouspartsof the never-ceasing
rhythmicmusic of the world, and I now easily realised the Pythagoreantheses:- the whole
universeis but an orderedsound.31
Theosophy's theory of sound also explains the idiosyncrasy of Foulds's brand of

modernism. In contrast to a work such as Stravinsky's Theriteof spring(1913),often
taken as the pre-eminent expression of early musical modernism, Foulds's style
is strikingly minimalist. It placed greater emphasis on the physical quality of
sound than on traditional components of music composition - melody, harmony,
and rhythm. He thought that timbre, the aural equivalent of texture, was the
most important building block of the music of the future, describing it as 'one
27
Composer's score, BL 56478.
28 Elisabeth
Lutyens, A goldfishbowl (London, 1972), p. 26.
29
Composer's score, BL 56478; Algernon Blackwood, The brightmessenger (Eureka, 2005).
30
Foulds, Music to-day,p. 349.
31 'F's
lessons', a letter of 1915 contained within a collection of Foulds's papers in the possession of
Malcolm MacDonald, quoted in Swann, 'Gentlemen versus players', p. 87.
442 JAMES G.MANSELL
of the most dynamic and magic-makingconstituentsof the sound-art'.32'I have
seen a far greater effect produced by a single note of a certain timbre',he ex-
plained, 'than by whole symphonies comprising uncountable thousands of
notes.'33This emphasis on timbre was a product of the Theosophical interest
in vibration and the physicalityof sound waves. Foulds believed that musical
composition, far from being a simple matter of form, should be allied to
psychologicaland biologicalinquiry: 'One has but to considerthe intricaciesof
the subconsciousand unrevealedself, and of its physicalinstrumentthe brainand
upon the whole to realizethe field that
nervoussystem . . . and the effectsof timbre
is before us.'34
An example of the ends to which Foulds was willing to venture in order
to create the ideal timbre is his use in the Requiem of the ' sistrum', a musical
instrumentwhich he invented to recreate a sound heard clairaudiently.'We
heard a sound which could not really be describedas a "musical sound" but
rather as a "musical noise'" wrote MacCarthy. It suggested, 'a breathing
through myriadsof gossamer- fine tiny wafers of precious metals, but with no
particularpitch'.35The sistrumwhich recreatedthis sound was similarto a harp
in appearancebut consistedof a multitudeof smallcymbals.In anticipationof its
firstuse in 1923the DailyMirrorprinteda photographof Fouldsproudlydisplaying
his creation.36His aim in usingthe sistrumwas to build up the precisetimbre,and
thus also vibrationrate, which would bring about the magicaleffectsthat Besant
had attributedto music in 1908. Although it bore little resemblanceto that of
other experimentaltechniquesof the period, Foulds'smusical aestheticwas no
less modernist in outlook. He rejected the formalismof European modernists,
such as Berg and Schoenberg,becausehe thoughttheirmusic devoid of vibratory
processand spiritualpurpose: 'The momentwe discernthe mainspringof a piece
of music to be a mere intellectualdevice, its magical spell is broken.'37
His book Musicto-day(1934)is a defence of musical modernismand its con-
nection to the occult. In it, he bemoaned the British habit of 'discounting in
advance any work by a composer who is not content to purvey stereotyped
emotional stimulant via the old-establishedmelodic and harmonic routes'.38
He sought a music of the future, but one that had a purpose connected to the
ideals of Theosophy. He believed in the value of musical simplicitybecause his
'
primaryaim was to affect the body and mind of the listener. Certainly thebeauty
and themagicof musiccan be enshrinedinfactorsfar moresimpleand at thesametimemore
potent than we of this complicatedage are apt to assume', he explained.39 Repetition,
stasis,and a deliberatelylimited harmonicvocabularywere used in the Requiem
as a means of recreatingthe meditativeeffectsof the mantra,describedby Besant
32 38
Foulds, Music to-day,p. 76. Ibid., p. 22 (emphasis original).
34 36
Ibid., p. 352 (emphasis original). Composer's score, BL 56478.
86 A
photograph of the sistrum was published in the Daily Mirror, 1 Nov. 1923.
37 38
Foulds, Music to-day,p. 55. Ibid., p. 25 (emphasis original).
39
Ibid., p. 343 (emphasis original).
as 'a sequence of sounds arranged so as to bring about a definite result'. cWhen
the subtle body is made to vibrate according to this sequence', she explained, 'it is
vibrating with the vibrations of the Devata [the Hindu equivalent of an angel],
and thus is more susceptible to his influence, more open to receive impressions
from him.'40
MacCarthy was equally scathing of artists who relied too heavily on the
aesthetic paradigms of the past:
There is somethingpatheticin the conditionof the modernartist,tying to nourishhis soul

upon the spiritualfood of bygone ages. Why should the gates of heaven be closed to-day?
Why should we not be able to reach and know the deeper regions of life, the habit of
the Ideal, ere yet we lay aside these garmentsof flesh- as did the apostlesand disciples,
in all lands, in all religions,of old? Ah! That men might produce the outlines of these
loftierworlds- none the less real and human, because they are hid from sense - for the
enhearteningof those who cannot yet pierce the veil, for the purifyingof the labours of
the world!41
Heaven is accessible to the human senses, according to MacCarthy, but only to

those people who have cultivated fine-tuned perception through study of the
occult. Progress in the arts and sciences is equated to an ever-closer bond with
God and His Kingdom. Those artists who achieve such progress have a duty to
share it with the world.
II
A WorldRequiem was intended for just this purpose. It was composed in two
distinctparts, each of ten movements.The firstpart follows ' the more orthodox
thought connected with the Requiem', but is 'interwoven with thoughts
promptedby internationalwars'.42It reassuresthe audiencethat 'Blessedare the
dead which die in the Lord', but pleadswith the nationsof the worldto findpeace
with one another: 'Nation shall not lift up sword against nation,/Neither shall
'
they learn war any more. The second part 'departsaltogetherfrom traditionas
expressedin the Requiem music of the past', and, in contrastto the first part,
deals entirelywith the mysteryof the afterlife.43
Its second movement, 'Elysium',
at which point the music 'becomes more and more other-worldly'is set to Kabir's
'
descriptionof heaven in which, Sorrow is no more,/The terrorof death is no
'
more. Death is a recurringtheme of the work as a whole and is representedin
the musical score by the use of the quarter-tone,a technique which Foulds
claimed to have been the first to deploy.44Conventionally,musical notes are
dividedinto divisionsno smallerthan a semi-tone(sharpenedand flattenednotes,
as with the blackkeyson a piano).By slidingthe fingeralong the stringof a violin
40 41
Besant, Religionand music,pp. 18-19. MacCarthy, 'True art', p. 206.
42 48
1923 concert programme, BL 56478. 1923 concert programme, BL 56478.
44
John Foulds to Adrian Boult, 16 Aug. 1933, BL 56482.
444 JAMES G.MANSELL
or a cello, however, smaller intervalscan be produced and Foulds used their
uncanny sound in the Requiem to representthe journey to the afterlife.
Quarter-tonesare the most remarkablestylisticfeature of the work. It other-
wise adheres to Foulds's ideal of simplicity,building up patterns of chromatic
chord progressions,rather than developing epic melodies as might be expected
of a work that calls for a full symphony orchestraand a chorus of a thousand
voices. Attainingthe correctvibrationtypes was more importantto Fouldsthan
formally pleasing harmonies, melodies, and rhythms. The 1926 concert pro-
gramme admitted as much: '[I]ts addressis to the spiritualrather than to the
emotional in man. Hence to some who do not breathe easily in a more rarefied
atmosphere,much of the musicmay seem to be remote,bleak,lackingthe human
touch and the personal appeal. There is little trace of a set melody, or of the
'45
ordinary aids to emotional stimulus. Far from finding their state of mind
altered or their wartime trauma healed, however, music criticswere baffled by
the lack of musical material. CIfind it, as music, extremely dull', wrote The
music critic. He continuedby explainingthat this dullnessis
Observer's
down largelyto an extravagantlackof both harmonicvarietyand melodicvitality.It is one
of the functionsof harmony to convey or enhance a sense of progression,but much of
Mr Foulds' harmony does not attempt to press forwardor, at any rate, does not long
maintainthe attemptto do so.46
An internal BBC report on the Requiemconfirmed the general feeling that the
work was
simply not good enough. And this is the reason why it has fallen into oblivion since its
performancein 1923.Apart from the defectsin the libretto,the music itselfis boring, one
would call it 'empty' music. A seriesof accompanimentswithout a strongtheme to them.
And endlessrepetition.And alwaysin the same key.47
The Timeswent further in its damnation of the work:
Once the ear has become accustomedto the solemn sensationproducedby certainsalient
chordprogressions,and one is no longer overawedby the grandiloquenceof its large-scale
presentation,the poverty of the musical ideas and the empty spaces where there is no
musicalidea at all, but merelythe declarationof wordswhich carryhallowedassociations,
become painful.48
Describing the work as painful must have particularly upset MacCarthy,

given her belief in the healing power of music. This was symptomaticof the
incompatibilityof her and Foulds'soccult ideas with the mainstreamcultureof
elite Britishmusic-making.Audiences,on the other hand, respondedin a deeply
emotionalfashionto the work'sperformance.One of many enthusiasticattendees
wrote to explain that, 'Your music floated throughmy being . . . and to me there
was healing in every note. The very state of mind produced was one of quiet
45 46
1926 concert programme, BL 56478. Observer,16 Nov. 1924.
47 48
BBC, Music Reports 1928-54 Fl-Fo. Times, 12 Nov. 1924.
ecstasy which I shall never forget.'49The discrepancybetween music critics'
hostilityand that of the apparentlywell-disposedaudience can perhaps be ex-
plained by the particularclass appeal of alternativespiritualitiesbetween 1890
and 1930. Although Theosophy was spearheadedby artists and intellectuals,
spiritualismhad a wide and popularcurrency.50It may account for the enthusi-
asm of the many ordinarymen and women who wrote to Fouldsto expresstheir
enjoymentof his Requiem.51
It could also have been that an objection to the work'stextual commitments
cloudedjudgement about its musicalscore in the minds of music critics.In con-
trast to the musical minimalism of the score, the internationalistand pacifist
tone of the Requiem's text, assembledby MacCarthy,is unambiguous.The call for
internationalunderstandingin 'Audite', movementfive of the firstpart, is one of
the work'scentrepieces.'Give ear, all ye nations of the world!/Give Ear, all ye
peoples of the earth!' exclaims its opening line. Consecutive stanzas are then
devotedin turnto the peoples of the North, South, East, and West. These stanzas
are accompaniedby a brassfanfarewhich comes, to the audience'ssurprise,from
the balcony of the Albert Hall, each time at different compass points. This
spatializationof the musicalscoreservedto remindthe audienceof theirrelativity
to the rest of the world. 'Be of one mind, live in peace/And the God of love and
peace shallbe with you', concludesthe stanzadevoted to the people of the West.
'For the Prince of Peace cometh,/And he will speakpeace to His people ... '. In
the next sectionthe music again comes from the balcony.In place of the fanfares
of distantnationscome the heavenlyvoices of a boys' chorusand the mysterious
sound of the sistrum. Happening above the heads of the audience, the clear
intention is to associate internationalreciprocitywith divine ordination. The
musical theme firstintroducedby the boys' chorus returnsin the second move-
ment as 'the motive of the Coming Christ'.52
This internationalismowed more to Theosophy's appeal for the culturalunity
of 'Aryan' traditionsthan to the Christianpacifismwhich became prevalentin
the 1930s. MacCarthy's1912lecture on Indian music, for example, concluded
that the similaritiesto be found between Easternand Westernmusic pointed to
the shared originsof a single Indo-Europeanculture.53She inferredthat nation
states, national cultures, and religious factions, particularlythose that divided
Europe and India, were artificialconstructs.Although Theosophy was particu-
larlyinterestedin India, it nonethelessdevelopeda more generalcommitmentto
49 This extractof a letter sent to Fouldsand

MacCarthywas reproducedin a pamphletof positive
feedback about the Festivalsof Remembrance compiled by MacCarthyin her quest to have the
Requiem revived.The pamphletconsistsof numerouslettersfrommembersof the public.A copy is held
in the BBCJohn FouldsFiles. 50 See andBritishsociety.
Hazelgrove,Spiritualism
51 The sheer of letters that Fouldsand MacCarthyreceivedand whichwere latercompiled
quantity
in the pamphletof positivefeedback(BBCJohn FouldsFiles)suggeststhat this is the case.
52
1923concertprogramme,BL 56478. '
53 Maud Mann
[theauthor'sfirstmarriedname], Some conceptionsof Indianmusic', Proceedingsof
theMusicalAssociation,38 (1911-12),pp. 41-65.
446 JAMES G.MANSELL
mutual tolerationand reciprocityamong all nations and religionsof the world.
Foulds hoped that his Requiem would capture a genuinely universalhumanity.
'It has been the composer'saspiration',explainedthe 1923concert programme,
' to
producea workwhich might belong to many nationsand creeds,so that amid
the clash and conflict of the races, of the religions, and of the factions, some
'54
expressionmight be found for the indestructiblespiritualunity of mankind.
Whilst the work'stext succinctlyencapsulatedthis aim, the search for a uni-
versal and internationalmusical style was more problematic.Foulds hoped to
achieve this through a fusion of European and Indian musical traditions.
Quarter-tones,for example, were an attemptto WesternizeIndian micro-tones.
This search for musicaluniversalismset Foulds apart in a period dominatedby
the Englishnationalfolkmusicrevivalof Stanford,Parry,and VaughanWilliams.
Although Foulds was interested in Celtic folk idioms, he resisted a wholesale
adoption of Britain'sfolk music revivalbecause,
forpresent-day composersandprotagonists uponsuch,oranyothernarrow
to concentrate
nationalisticphenomena,goescleanagainstthe mainevolutionary trendof the art.Only
outof a newrealizationof world-wideemotional-mental - evensolidarity
solidarity - can
the realmusicof thefuturebe born.55
He added later that
It is just becauseso manyof our composershave respondedto the Englishnational
vibrationthat they have done so littleworkwhichmay be describedas universal.No
creativeartistwhocannottranscend thelevelsat which(upto which)nationality
manifests,
canbe capableof workof universal
appeal.56
The quest for universalmusic which led Foulds to reject nationalismmeant
that his Requiem was not easily categorizedby contemporariesin an age in which
genre became increasinglysignificant.The BBC, in particular,mistookFoulds's
humanismfor a thinlyveiled popularismof which it remaineddeeply suspicious.
The composer was obviously sensitive to such criticism: the 1926 Festival of
Remembranceconcertprogrammeexplainedthat the Requiem's 'universalappeal
demandsthat its broad basis and centralthemesbe of the utmostsimplicity,even
at the riskof seeming,to more musicallytutoredminds, too obviousin statement
and progression\57By universalappeal,Fouldsalso meant that his Requiem should
be comprehensibleto ordinary Britons. The Observer's music critic, writing on
Foulds'sinstruction,noted that 'The composer has deliberatelyadopted a har-
monic scheme which can be appreciated"by the average musical intelligence
of the day'", and TheTimesrecognizedthat 'On the whole, Mr. Fouldshas aimed
at those who know less, and for a good reason.'58
Yet this did not fit the BBC's emerging'divisivetaxonomy' of music. Meirion
Hughes and Robert Stradlinghave argued that its dichotomy between 'light'
54 55
IQ23 concert programme, BL 56478. Foulds, Music to-day,p. 18.
56 57
Ibid, p. 224. 1926 concert programme, BL 56478.
Observer,4 Nov. 1923; Times, 17 Nov. 1923.
and ' serious' music became increasinglycrystallizedin the interwarperiod as a
result of the growing suspicion of mass consumerismand its impact upon the
sanctityof art.59The folk revival of mainstreamBritishcomposers,while it was
intended to popularizeclassicalmusic, remained legitimate 'serious' music be-
cause it representedessentialcharacteristicsof the Britishpeople, as opposed to
the corruptinginfluences of mass entertainment.Since his occultism led him
to reject the historicismand nationalismof the folk revival and because he was
also willing to score for the theatre and to write popular tunes for the musical
market, Foulds's work embodied a dangerous modernity in the minds of the
Britishmusicalelite, particularlythe BBC. Their reactionwas to relegatehim to
light music radio programmes,ultimatelya successfulmeans by which to deny
him legitimacyas a seriousBritishcomposer.
In an angryletterwrittenin 1933to AdrianBoult, the BBC'sdirectorof music,
Fouldspointed out that
Within the last two years I have submittedfour worksto the BBC. These, in my opinion,
containsome of my most valuablework.In each case they were rejectedby your Selection
Committee.The position,therefore,is that while my principalseriousworkshave received
the approvalof some of the greatest names in the musical world, and also of practical
conductors,it would appear,judging from past experience,that any seriouswork of mine
has a poor chance of winning the approvalof the BBC Selection Committee.
In the mean time my light works are continuallybroadcast.These light works number
a dozen or so, as comparedwith the total of 50 of my seriousworks.This state of affairs,
I thinkyou will agree, is rathera gallingone for a seriousartist.60
An internalcirculatingmemo withinthe BBC in 1932appearsto confirmFoulds's

fear that he had been relegatedto 'light' status. 'We have been worrieda good
deal in the past off and on by this Composer.The difficultyhas alwaysbeen that
we thinkthat almostall his music is very dull stuff,and the more seriousit is the
dullerit becomes.'61Boultwrote in anotherinternalreportthat 'The man is quite
a good composer,and I believe "The Requiem" made a deep impression',but
afterthe comma is a tellinghandwritteninsertion,'of lighterstuff5.62
Foulds'scredibilityas a seriouscomposerwas seriouslydamagedby the BBC's
pigeon-holing.A. H. Haggard,a friendof the composer,testifiedthat the BBC's
preferencefor his 'light' works, 'resulted in their creator being labelled "light
composer"and seen in quite the wrong perspectiveby the musicalworld'.63Yet
while Foulds made clear that light works such as the much-broadcastedKeltic
Lament(1911)were intended only to pay the bills, he did not necessarilymake
such a sharpseparationbetween 'serious' and 'popular' as the BBC. In a letter
to his friend and collaboratorGeorge BernardShaw in 1925,Foulds objectedto
69 Meirion
Hughes and Robert Stradling, The English musical renaissance,i86o-ig4o: constructinga
nationalmusic(Manchester, 2001), p. 108.
60
John Foulds to Adrian Boult, 16 Aug. 1933, BL 56482.
61 62 Ibid.
BBC, ohn Foulds Files.
63 A. H.
Haggard to Sir Hamilton Harty, 10 Mar. 1933, BL 56478.
448 JAMES G.MANSELL
the writerreferringto his 'style': 'I thinkI have a greaterdiversityof styles', he
replied, 'than almost any other composer I know of. Certainly I have dealt
faithfullyand lovinglywith many a tune "straightfrom the heartsof the people"
as your soldier says [referring,presumably,to SaintJoan].'64The Requiem was
certainlyan attempt to communicate to the broadest possible social spectrum.
This was consonant with Theosophy's social commitments in general, which
were stronglyaffiliatedwith the reformingleft of Britishpolitics (particularlythe
Fabian Society),but adopting a simple and universalmusicallanguagewas also
necessarygiven that Foulds conceived of his work as an experimentin occult
healing as much as a piece of music. This esotericismdid not communicateto an
elite audience more used to the Englishnessof Vaughan Williams and to the
formalism of Stravinsky.Foulds's attempt to forge a social and international
universalismwas quarantinedby the British musical elite under the charge of
'popularism'.
Ill
Ultimately, however, it was neither music critics'boredom nor the BBC's ani-
mosity that caused the BritishLegion to withdrawits supportfor the Requiem in
1927. The work had become a pawn in a wider culturalconflict played out in
national newspapersabout the correct format for ArmisticeNight. The British
LegionJournalshowed its awareness of this conflict in 1923 in writing that
'ArmisticeDay will ever stand out as markingthe greatestglory and the greatest
'65
tragedyof the war. The problem of strikinga balance between celebrationof
the glory and commemorationof the tragedy came to divide Britishsociety in
the mid-i92os. Prior to 1923,the Albert Hall had hosted 'armisticejazz' on the
evening of 11 November. Foulds's Requiem,with its opening lines, 'Requiem
aeternam/Lord, grant them rest eternal ... All those who have fallen in
battle . . . Men of all countrieswho died for their cause,/Lord, grant them rest
eternal', marked a significantchange in the culture of ArmisticeNight: a turn
towardssolemn commemorationrather than rejoicing.Newspaperssuch as the
DailyMail thought that ArmisticeDay should indeed be reservedfor just such
commemorativeacts. Other papers, in particularthe DailyExpress,thought that
the solemnityof eleven a.m. was sufficientcommemorationof the dead, and that
the evening should be given over, as in 1918, to celebrationof the war's end and
victoriousoutcome.
It is no surprise,then, that the DailyMail was a keen supporterof the Requiem.
It assuredits readers in 1925 that it had 'establisheditself for the musical cel-
ebrationof ArmisticeDay'.66This statementwas timed to have a politicalimpact.
64
John Fouldsto George BernardShaw, 26 Apr. 10,25,BL 50510.
65 BritishLemon
Journal, Nov. 1923, p. 135.
66 This was
among the quotes in the pamphletproducedby Foulds and MacCarthyto showcase
positiveresponsesto the Requiem,
BBCJohn FouldsFiles.
It was in 1925 that Foulds and MacCarthy were forced to move their Festival to
the Queen's Hall in order to accommodate a revival of the 'victory ball' tradition
at the Albert Hall. This event was proposed by a committee led by Lord
Northampton and the duchess of Sutherland in aid of the Royal Northern
Hospital. Although it had been de rigueurin the immediate post-war years, a
victory ball caused great controversy when proposed again in 1925. For example,
one anonymous letter to The Timesin October read :
It is of course possible to make a plausible cause for anything- even for dancing on
ArmisticeDay. Whether 'that victoryfeeling' is the real motive or only the excuse is for
each to settle with his own conscience. The fact remains that most of us regard an
ArmisticeDay ball as an outrageon decency. It does not prove callousness,it betokensa
painfullack of imagination.67
The archbishops of Canterbury and York both denounced the planned ball,
and in the light of the support they received, the ball was duly cancelled. Lord
Northampton wrote to The Times on 5 November expressing his surprise that,
despite victory balls having taken place annually at various venues since 1918,
'This year, however, during the last week, it has become apparent that a section
of the community has a strong feeling against public rejoicing on Armistice
'68 The
Day. conflict, he suggested, seemed to be not so much about whether
victory balls should be tolerated but whether one should take place at the Albert
Hall, a symbol of national culture, on Armistice Night. The planned ball of 1925
was moved to another day and replaced at the Albert Hall with a Remembrance
Service led by the Reverend H. R. L. Sheppard who had led the campaign for a
purely commemorative Armistice Day and later became a leader of the Peace
Pledge Movement.69 Sheppard's letter to The Timeson 20 October 1925, which
called for a need to 'retain for Armistice Day the setting of a solemn reverence
and gratitude in which a people may remember its duty both to the living and to
the dead', had sparked the national debate about the proposed ball.70
Sheppard's victory was followed by the return of Foulds's Requiemat the Albert
Hall in 1926, leading to a clear association in many people's minds between
-
religious authority Sheppard had given the very first religious broadcast on the
-
BBC in 1924 and the return of the Requiem.This conflict over the correct
marking of Armistice Night in 1925 signalled a significant split between secular
and religious culture in interwar Britain. The Daily Expresstook exception to
religious leaders vetoing celebratory events :
From the earliesttimes- until this year, when an unwholesomeand unnaturalchange is
-
sought to be made mankindhas signalisedits gratitudeand joy for its successesin war,
and its releasefromthe travailswhich war brings,by prayerand by merrymaking.The two
coursesare not inconsistent.71
67 68
Tunes, 24 Oct. 1925. Times,5 Nov. 1925.
69 Scott. Dick a
Carolyn Sheppard: biography(London, 1977), pp. 140-2.
70 71
Tunes, 20 Oct. 1925. Daily Express,7 Nov. 1925.
450 JAMES G.MANSELL
The correct course, according to the Express,was to commemorate the war
with solemnity at the cenotaph in the morning and to celebrate its victorious
outcomewith singingand dancingin the evening.There was no place for another
cenotaph in the evening, let alone a musicalvarietyof cenotaphwhich sounded
too much like a victoryfor religionover Britishness.In this sense,A WorldRequiem
was unfortunateto have adoptedsuch obviousreligiouscontent,for it was not to
its esotericismthat the Expressobjected,but to its religion,which was erroneously
assumedto be alignedwith the church'sobjectionto Armisticecelebration.
The Manchester Guardian had broughta similarobjectionto bear on the religious
content of the Requiem as early as 1923. 'Why Mr. Foulds should call his work
a "World Requiem" I do not know', wrote the paper's music critic Ernest
Newman.
Duringthe lastthreeor fouryearsmorethanone zealousbodyhasmadethe mistakeof
tryingto puta purelyChristian uponthelocalwarmemorial,
inscription andhashadto be
remindedthatamongthe men who diedfor theircountrywereFreethinkers, Jews,and
otherswhohadeitherno religionat allor a religionotherthanChristian.72
Yet it was not to religionas such that the Expressobjected,but to a form of pacifist
Christianitythat later grew in statureunder the leadershipof movementssuch as
the Peace Pledge and its white poppies. The Expresssought a form of established
religiosity compatible with national pride and the necessity of war. For this
reason, the paper had taken a dim view of the Requiemsince 1923, on which
occasionit had describedthe work as 'purely "occasional"music, dependingfor
its effecton circumstances,on the public'spredisposition,on the suggestivenessof
many sublime words rather than any inherent musical interest'. The music, it
thought, was 'facile' and 'glib', but tellingly it also noted that 'The evening
'73
proved how desirablean ArmisticeDay concert might be each year.
When the British Legion announced that Armistice Night 1927 would be
marked by the first 'DailyExpressRemembranceFestival' at the Albert Hall it
came as a surpriseto Foulds and MacCarthy.Although they made no public
attackon the Legion,MacCarthylaterwrote that its founder,FieldMarshallEarl
Haig, 'stooped' to a 'conspiracy of silence' in the full knowledge that 'The
original intention was an annual nation-wide Festival of Remembrance. By
intrigue', she adds, 'this was stopped, as the BritishLegion well knows.'74The
original intention was, in fact, to establish annual performancesof A World
Requiem throughoutthe towns and cities of Britain. In 1923 Haig wrote of his
'
hope that, on each ArmisticeDay many thousandswill sing the workthroughout
the land'.75The BritishLegion Journalwent so far as to suggest that it hoped for
annualperformancesof the Requiem 'throughoutthe Empire\76In 1924,TheTimes
72 Manchester 78
Guardian,15 Nov. 1923. Daily Express,12 Nov. 1023.
74 Handwritten annotation to the
promotional pamphlet, BBC Tohn Foulds Files.
75 This
letter, written 'to the musicians of Great Britain', was reprinted on the back inside-cover of
Foulds's Musk Picturesfor the Young,Opus21 as printed by W. Paxton & Co.
76 British
LegionJournal, Nov. 1923, p. 147.
reportedthat, in additionto the annual Festivalat the AlbertHall, simultaneous

Armistice Night performances of A WorldRequiemwere to take place in
Birminghamand Bristol.77By 1927,however,this positionhad changedradically,
and it was the Daily Expressthat played the key role in convincing the British
Legion to withdrawits support.
Haig's silence after 1926explainsthe lack of detailsin MacCarthy'saccountof
the axing. She wrote only that ' Some back door businesswas broughtto bear on
high officialsand the thing was stoppedas if my husbandhad been an impostor.
I found out later that this injustice was engineered through one "jealous
person".'78That person may well have been another composerwho felt that an
occasion such as ArmisticeNight should have provided a platformfor someone
with a musicalreputationto match. That was certainlythe feeling of the Express
in 1923: 'Great events do not inevitablycall forth the supreme artist fitted to
celebrate them', stated its reviewer.79It is significantthat, on ArmisticeNight
1923, the BBC had chosen to broadcast an alternative concert rather than
Foulds'sRequiem, which includeda renditionof GodSavetheKingand two pieces,
Imperial March and Landof HopeandGlory,by EdwardElgar, alreadyestablished
as the foremostBritishcomposerof his generation.A year later in 1924,the BBC
again decided not to broadcast the Requiem,preferringinstead, 'Two works
by British composers who were killed in action', A Shropshire Lad by George
Butterworthand EnglishPastoralImpressions by Ernest Farrar. This suggests a
strong preferenceat the BBC for music of the English pastoral'mould and '
the
extent to which a lack of military experience and shortfallin serious music
credentialsworked against Foulds'scause. The Expressconsideredhim to have
staged a coupd'taton ArmisticeNight music-making,taking advantage of the
BritishLegion'slack of wherewithalin failingto take centralcontrolof Armistice
events in the earlyyears of its existence.
Despite the BBC's general hostilityto Foulds as a serious composer, Boult's
correspondencewith MacCarthy on the topic of the Requiemwas correct in
pointing to the Express's enigmaticowner, Lord Beaverbrook,as the key protag-
onist in the axing.80Beaverbrookwas well known for such interventionsin cul-
tural and political life and his paper was already strongly associatedwith the
promotionof communitysinging.In 1926,for example,it had promotedan event
entitled 'Beauty of Englishhymns' in Birminghamat which the audience'spar-
ticipation, it was hoped, would 'serve to revive and repopularisemany of the
grand old songs of England', and 'reveal the great national wealth of Beauty
that lies in our hymns and sacredchorus'.81A year later, the paper adopted this
same format at the Albert Hall on ArmisticeNight. Captain Mike Wardell,the
paper'sblackeye-patch-wearingand laterfascist-sympathizing businessmanager,
77 78 BBC 79
Times,10 Nov. 1924. John FouldsFiles. DailyExpress,12Nov. 1923.
80 AdrianBoult,'Internalmemo - '
subjectMrs Foulds letter',21 Dec. 1931,BBCJohn FouldsFiles.
81
DailyExpress,13Nov. 1926.
452 JAMES G.MANSELL
was responsiblefor organizingthe new event.82With the supportof the Legion,
he replaced the Requiem with 'wartime and other popular songs and choruses'
which were sung by reunited servicemen.83The paper appropriated the
'Remembrance Festival' label without Foulds's and MacCarthy'spermission.
'The festival', it explained, 'has been organisedto recapturethe splendidcom-
'84
radeshipof the war years.
Despite the conflict over the proposedvictory ball in 1925,the Festival'snew
format,which remainsrelativelyunchangedto this day, was far from irreligious.
The 1928versiondirectedby MalcolmSargentincludedan addressby the bishop
of London and future Festivalswere undertakenwith a giant crucifix on the
Albert Hall's stage. Indeed, the OfficialHistoryof theBritishLegionrecalls that
the Expressestablisheda Festivalthat later assumed'the characterof a religious
ceremony'.85In contrastto Foulds'sand Sheppard'spacifism,the Express adopted
a formatin which patriotismand militarysolidaritywere shownto be compatible
with religion. In terms of their global politics, though, the contrastbetween the
new RemembranceFestivaland Foulds'sRequiem could not have been greater.
While Fouldsand MacCarthycalledfor internationalunityand peace, the Express
sought to promote Britishculturaltraditionsand a worldviewbased on the con-
tinued power of the BritishEmpire.This was part of Beaverbrook'spro-Empire
agenda and particularlyhis campaign for Empire protectionismof which the
Express'scrusaderemblem was representative.86
'The air was blue with the smoke of our pipes and fags- how could we sing
war songs without fags?-when we came at last to "Tipperary"', recalled an
attendee of the 1927 Festival. 'That was our final song. We sent it round the
world.'87The meaningof thisfinalremarkno doubtrefersto the volume at which
the song was sung, but it is also resonantwith a nationalpride in the worldwide
achievementsof the BritishArmedForces.The authormust also have been aware
that the Express's1927 Festival was chosen, in contrast to the BBC's earlier
reluctanceto broadcastA WorldRequiem, as the very first broadcastof the BBC
Empire Service, later to become the World Service, so 'Tipperary'was indeed
heard across the world.88During the 1930s and 1940s, the annual event was
temporarilyrenamed 'A Festival of Empire and Remembrance', suggestinga
global politicsfar removedfrom Foulds'soriginalintentionsof 1923.
The abrupt axing of the Requiemand its replacementwith patriotic singing
was only part of the indignityfor Fouldsand MacCarthy.In 1931,the RadioTimes
82 Wardell was rememberedas a

'near-supporterof [Oswald] Mosley' by Michael Foot in an
interviewwith Bill Hagerty, 'The real crusader',BritishJournalism Review,13 (2002),p. 26. Wardell's
role in organizingthe RemembranceFestivalis recountedby GrahamWootton in Theofficial history
of
theBritishLegion(London,1956),p. 104.
83 The event was billed in this
way by the RadioTimes,11Nov. 1023.
84 85
DailyExpress,11Nov. 1927. Wootton, Official history,
p. 104.
86 A. P. Beaverbrook 87 British
J. Taylor, (London,1972). LegionJournal, Dec. 1927, p. 149.
88
DailyExpress,11Nov. 1927.
ran an article on the history of the Festival of Remembrance which suggested that
1927 was its year of inauguration and that the Daily Expresswas its founder:
An AlbertHall Festivalhas become traditionalin ArmisticeDay programmes.In 1927and
1928the Festivalwas organizedby the DailyExpress;since then it has been held under the
auspicesof the BritishLegion. Stirringmusic and the singingof war-timesongsdistinguish
this annualreunionof ex-Servicemen.89
By making no mention of A WorldRequiemin this feature, the Radio Timeseffec-

tively wrote Foulds's and MacCarthy's contribution out of history, confirming the
'
latter's conclusion that the Requiemwas not only stopped but every reference to
'
it ... stopped and stamped out since \ She righdy pointed out that We createdthe
festival, and by much hard work. I would not weary you with all we did and
suffered to create that National Festival', reads her letter to the BBC, parent
company of the Radio Times. 'We had no organisation. It was private voluntary
-
help. The Requiem was a mere lever we gave our services entirely at personal
'
loss which I will not detail. Furious with the Radio Times,she explained to Boult
that 'There is such a thing as hitting below the belt, and the Radio Timesappears
to do this in this week's Armistice Article. I do wish you could get a little fair play
forJohnFoulds.'90
IV
Recognitionof Foulds'sand MacCarthy'srole in the establishmentof the Festival
of Remembrance has never been forthcoming from the (now Royal) British
Legion. When A WorldRequiem was revived on 11 November 2007 few people
seemedto realizethat it was the precursorto the militarybands that now perform
annuallyat the Royal Albert Hall's RemembranceFestival.Criticsare still div-
ided aboutwhetherthe Requiem shouldbe admittedto the canon of Englishchoral
music, and for this reason it will probablynever receive the attentionit deserves
from musicologists.91 Yet A WorldRequiem allows historiansto make useful con-
nectionsbetween an enduringfin-de-sicle occult spiritualityon the one hand, and
a political conflict over the musical commemorationof ArmisticeNight on the
other. Foulds's and MacCarthy'sTheosophy was an attempt to universalize
religion on peaceful and transnationalterms; the Daily Express'sagenda drew
upon an equallyenduringtraditionin which religionand patriotismwere wholly
compatible.92 This was ultimatelythe more powerfulof the two and was bolstered
by the bureaucratization of nationalcultureat the BBC. Nonetheless,the history
89 'ArmisticeDay, November 11,1931',RadioTimes,6 Nov. 1931,p. 453.

90 Maud
MacCarthyto AdrianBoult, 10 Nov. 1931,BBCJohn FouldsFiles.
91 Critical and the subsequentrelease
receptionof the 11Nov. 2007performanceof A WorldRequiem
of a two-discCD of the piece were greeted with a similarcriticalreceptionto that of 1923, that is,
puzzlementat the lack of musicalmaterial.
92 O. Anderson, 'The
growth of Christianmilitarismin mid-Victorian Britain', EnglishHistorical
Review,86 (1971),pp. 46-72.
454 JAMES G.MANSELL
of A WorldRequiem adds greatlyto our understandingof the homogeneousrituals
and aestheticsof memory duringthe formativedecade of the 1920s.
Foulds'sRequiem also poses difficultquestionsof the historiographyof British
modernism.Music has rarelyfeaturedin it becausethe narrativeof 'nationalfolk
revival' has so thoroughlypervaded the history of early twentieth-centuryart
music.93Althoughthis revivalaccountsfor Foulds'soutsiderstatusin the musical
culture of the 1920s,his Theosophical brand of modernismis intellectuallyim-
portant because it was designed first and foremost to harness the physicality
of sound as an agent of medicinaland psychologicalhealing.That the inspiration
for this projectcame from an ancient traditionof musical mysticismis evidence
that modernismdoes not representas sharp a break from the past as some his-
torianswould have us believe.94Preciselybecauseit has neglectedmusic,the study
of modernismand modernityhas taken too simplistica view of what constitutes
innovation and progress.As a consequence, the question of what amounted to
the dominant artisticreaction to the First World War has been distorted.The
extraordinarysensitivityto sound demonstratedby Foulds and MacCarthyalso
suggeststhe need for historiansto pay great attentionto the sensorydimensions
of culture.Music is more than an expressionof ideology or of social discourses
of power. A WorldRequiem was an engagementwith, and an attemptto reshape,
the perceptualexperienceof everydayauralityin the aftermathof total war.
93 Frank
Howes, The English musical renaissance(London, 1966); Hughes and Stradling, The English
musical renaissance',Michael Trend, The music makers:the English musical renaissance
from Elgar to Britten
(New York,NY, 1985).
94 Marshall
Berman, All that is solid meltsinto air: theexperience
of modernity(London, 1983).

James G. Mansell, Musical Modernity and Contested Commemoration at The Festival of Remembrance, 1923-1927, The Historical Review, Vol. 52, No. 2, June 2009, Pp. 433-454.

Încărcat de

Informații document

Titlu original

Drepturi de autor

Formate disponibile

Partajați acest document

Partajați sau inserați document

Opțiuni de partajare

Vi se pare util acest document?

Este necorespunzător acest conținut?

Drepturi de autor:

Formate disponibile

James G. Mansell, Musical Modernity and Contested Commemoration at The Festival of Remembrance, 1923-1927, The Historical Review, Vol. 52, No. 2, June 2009, Pp. 433-454.

Încărcat de

Drepturi de autor:

Formate disponibile

Musical Modernity and Contested Commemoration at the Festival of Remembrance, 1923-1927

Author(s): James G. Mansell

MUSICAL MODERNITY AND

abstract. musicinto thehistoryof war commemoration

Despite the ongoing attentiondevoted to the culturalimpact of the Great War,

School of Arts, Histories and Cultures,Universityof Manchester,OxfordRoad, Manchester,M13 gPLJames.

Fig. 1. Promotional flyer from the 1926 Festival of Remembrance, BL 56478.

A widespreadpracticingacquaintancewith the lovely Sound-Mysterycould liberate im-

The 'Cenotaph in Sound' subtitle of the Requiemwas certainly no gimmick.

Fig. 2. Front cover of the 1923Festivalof Remembranceconcertprogramme,BL 56478.

The imperativeto protect and disseminatethe sonicallybeautifulwas crucial

Independent corroboration of this is to be found in the memoirs of Elisabeth

Theosophy's theory of sound also explains the idiosyncrasy of Foulds's brand of

There is somethingpatheticin the conditionof the modernartist,tying to nourishhis soul

Heaven is accessible to the human senses, according to MacCarthy, but only to

Describing the work as painful must have particularly upset MacCarthy,

49 This extractof a letter sent to Fouldsand

An internalcirculatingmemo withinthe BBC in 1932appearsto confirmFoulds's

reportedthat, in additionto the annual Festivalat the AlbertHall, simultaneous

82 Wardell was rememberedas a

By making no mention of A WorldRequiemin this feature, the Radio Timeseffec-

89 'ArmisticeDay, November 11,1931',RadioTimes,6 Nov. 1931,p. 453.

S-ar putea să vă placă și