Mary Ward House, 17 September 1985
Reviewed in Delius Society Journal 90, p3
(with recorded music examples)
Part 1: 57’ 57″
Listen to Margaret Harrison in conversation with Felix Aprahamian – Part 1
The evening begins with an old recording, originally a 78 rpm disc, that established the speaker as a musician of considerable merit in her own right and not just as one of the famous Harrison sisters. At 86 Margaret was the last surviving member (and the youngest) of that remarkable family, with vivid memories of her background and her musical life, and with an amazing recall when prompted by Felix Aprahamian who himself had heard the sisters perform on a number of occasions at concerts at Limpsfield and elsewhere. Patricia Cleveland-Peck, biographer of the Harrison sisters, was also present and made helpful contributions.
The eldest sisters, May and Beatrice, were born in India in 1890 and 1892, Monica in London in 1897, and Margaret at the Chatham Barracks in 1899. Their father was a talented amateur flautist, while their mother was a singer and pupil of George Henschel and Gustave Garcia at the Royal College of Music, yet confined by the Victorian conventions of the day to entertaining guests and wanting her daughters to have the opportunities that were denied her. When May and Beatrice won scholarships to the Royal College of Music, their father retired from the army and the family settled in London. Initially Margaret had intentions of becoming a Doctor of Music, but after taking two exams she decided ‘it wasn’t imaginative enough’ for her.
A special edition of the Delius Society Journal No 87 (Autumn 1985), devoted to the Harrison sisters, included an interview from the previous year with Margaret about the many outstanding musicians she had known, Delius of course among them. As Felix Aprahamian commented at the meeting, the number of people then still living who had met and knew Delius was extremely small: famously Eric Fenby, Ida Gerhardi (who spoke of her memories in Delius Society Journal No 146, Autumn 2009, pp19-28), Gerald Moore, Margaret Harrison, and of course Felix himself who was to speak of his visit to Grez in the third of these recorded talks in November 1989. In his autobiography Am I too loud? the celebrated accompanist Gerald Moore wrote briefly of visiting Delius at Grez with the Harrison sisters and their mother, and playing to the composer who was so ‘paralysed and blind’ that ‘his attendant, a German monk, carried him about as if he were a child’ (p.63). But Margaret alone had memories of Delius when he was sighted and active.
It was in Manchester on 3rd December 1914 that the Harrisons first met Delius. Beatrice and May were playing the Brahms Double Concerto with the Hallé Orchestra under Beecham. The Dance at the Fair and The Walk to the Paradise Garden were also in the programme and Delius was present. After the concert the sisters were introduced to Delius, and it was hearing their performance of the Brahms that made him want to compose a double concerto for them. This was not performed until 21st February 1920 with Henry Wood conducting the Queen’s Hall Orchestra. As Beatrice wrote in her autobiography The Cello and the Nightingales (p104):
‘It was to be some years before we played it in public. The strange thing was that it was written in unison and technically was almost impossible to play but with Delius himself and Philip Heseltine at the piano, we rewrote the cello part and made it playable.’
The Caprice and Elegy and the Cello Sonata were dedicated to Beatrice, and Violin Sonata No 3 to May.
One of the revelations of the evening was that Margaret had studied under Stanford at the Royal College. It is little known that Stanford also wrote a double concerto, the Irish Concertino for Violin and Cello Op 161, an 18-minute two-movement work that Margaret and Beatrice introduced at Margaret’s Wigmore Hall début in December 1918, performed on that occasion with Hamilton Harty at the piano. Unfortunately no time was found that evening to discuss Stanford as a teacher.
The music played in the first half was
| Smetana | Songs of my homeland | Margaret Harrison, Reginald Paul | 0’01’’ |
| Delius | Serenade from Hassan | Beatrice and Margaret Harrison | 30’27” |
| Delius | Violin Sonata No 1 | May Harrison, Arnold Bax | 39’30” |
Part 2: 50’ 18″
Listen to Margaret Harrison in conversation with Felix Aprahamian – Part 2
The second half included questions from the audience about various musicians such as Frank Bridge, John Ireland, Mark Raphael, Glazunov (with whom Beatrice became acquainted in Russia), Cyril Scott, Percy Grainger and Elgar, Margaret responding with many delightful stories.
The evening concluded with
| Delius | Cello Sonata | Beatrice Harrison, Harold Craxton | 34’42” |
It proved to be a very special experience, listening to historical recordings made by three of the Harrison sisters in the presence of the only one of them then living.