Another child prodigy, this son of a respectable west country family, born in Teignmouth is thought to have given his first concert at the age of ten. However at 15 he was turned down on the final audition for the newly formed Royal Academy of Music.
A talented harpist he soon found other tutors and found work at a London harpmaker. He set off on a continental concert tour in 1830 which as well as more usual stops (Bremen, Moscow, Copenhagen, Stockholm) also saw him perform for the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire in Constantinople.
Here the director of music was Giuseppe Donizetti (elder brother of the composer Gaetano Donizetti).
He returned not to London but Vienna where he published his first works and was taken under the wing by Countess Jeanette Esterházy. She became his main patron for the rest of his life and organised an appointment as first harpist to the Vienna Opera.
He performed to great acclaim. His techniques were said to be revolutionary. Berlioz called him the “Liszt of the harp”. When in 1848 he announced he would return to the land of his birth for a brief residence in London, his final concerts in Vienna were completely sold out. In London he was rapturously received with sell out concerts, offers of work tutoring and selling large numbers of copies of his music.
He remains one of the most prominent composers of music for the harp.
He returned to Vienna only to die of the palsy the following year.
Perfect, so much so I’ll play it again. Luckily I had no advertisements in my listening experience so they obviously paid attention!
Wonderful! Our son of Teignmouth done well! But four awful commercial breaks in 22 minutes is four too many ...