Conductor, Leslie Woodgate
Gwladys Naish (Soprano)
Sir Julius Benedict, though counted as among our English composers, was really a German who made his home with us. He occupied a leading place in the Victorian world of music; for about forty years he was looked up to as one of its leaders.
Remembered now almost wholly by his opera, The Lily of Killarney, he won several successes, not only in that direction, but in sacred oratorios and cantatas. He left besides some purely orchestral music which is still occasionally played.
These brilliant concert variations on the well-known 'Carnival of Venice' air were long among his most popular drawing-room pieces.
Few modern English composers of light and graceful music have earned our gratitude more fully than John Ansell, who was for some years the popular conductor of the London Wireless Orchestra, before the B.B.C. Orchestra was formed. Although in every way a thoroughly equipped musician, who is at home in the most serious realms of music, he has no great sympathy with any of the ultra-modern tendencies, nor with music of sombre and gloomy purport. He would have music bring more brightness into the daily round, and his own is all fresh and wholesome. The subjects he chooses are many and varied; but whether it be the merriment of children, the sea and ships, dances or shoes, he always leaves his hearer with a happy sense that the world is not so dull a place as he may have thought.