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Raymond Jeremy

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Raymond Jeremy
Birth nameWilliam Raymond Thomas Jeremy
Born(1890-11-22)22 November 1890
Laugharne, Carmarthenshire, Wales
Died12 March 1969(1969-03-12) (aged 78)
Aberystwyth, Cardiganshire, Wales
GenresClassical
Occupation(s)Musician, professor
InstrumentViola

Raymond Jeremy, FRAM, (1890-1969) was a British violist, known for his quartet playing, particularly the first performances of Edward Elgar's String Quartet and Piano Quintet.[1] He was professor of violin and viola at the Royal Academy of Music in London and taught the violist Watson Forbes.

Biography

[edit]

Raymond Jeremy was born in Laugharne, Wales in 1890. His early instruction on the violin was in Wales with Oliver Williams.[2] After three years of study with Williams, Jeremy was awarded the Ada Lewis scholarship to study at the Royal Academy of Music in London,[3] where his violin professor was Hans Wessely. During his final year at the academy, he met Lionel Tertis and turned to the viola.[4] Whilst at the Royal Academy of Music, Jeremy twice won the Charles Rube Prize for ensemble playing.[5][6]

Jeremy played in Thomas Beecham's Symphony Orchestra in 1910 when Richard Strauss's new operas Elektra and Salome, received their first performances in Britain. He also played in Sir Henry Wood's Queen's Hall Orchestra.[4]

Jeremy played with numerous ensembles over his playing career including the Kutcher String Quartet,[7] the International Quartet,[8] the Allied Quartet,[4] the Philharmonic Quartet, the London Piano Quartet,[9] the Virtuoso Quartet,[10][11] the Meredyll Quartet,[8] the Harp Ensemble,[8] the Spencer Dyke Quartet,[12] the British String Quartet,[13] the Sybil Eaton Quartet,[14] and the Henkel Piano Quartet.[15][8] He also accompanied other String Quartets such as the London String Quartet and the Stratton Quartet.[16]

With the Philharmonic quartet, Jeremy played in the premieres of two works by Arnold Bax, the In Memoriam sextet (1917) and the G major quartet (1918).[4] During the first world war, Jeremy recalls playing quartets with cellist Arthur Williams (brother of Jeremy's first teacher), Jelly d'Aranyi and Adila Fachiri, and stated that he learned the most about musical performance by playing string quartets with this ensemble. It was his connection with the d'Aranyi sisters which gave him a way in to the high-society world of music.[4]

Jeremy was a good friend of Sir Edward Elgar[4] and gave the first public performances of Elgar's String Quartet and Piano Quintet at the Wigmore Hall on 20 May 1919, with Albert Sammons and W. H. Reed (violins), Felix Salmond (cello) and William Murdoch (piano).[17] He also performed at Lady Elgar's funeral in April 1920, playing the Andante Piacevole from Elgar's string quartet.[18] In that year Jeremy also played at the first private performance of Arthur Bliss's Conversations.

In December 1924 he performed at the Wigmore Hall in London with the celebrated Russian harpist Maria Korchinska in a performance of Debussy's Sonata for Flute, Viola and Harp.[19][20] In 1927 Jeremy gave the premiere of Bax's Phantasy Sonata, with Korchinska, the work's dedicatee. Jeremy continued to play with Korchinska in recitals around Great Britain throughout the 1930s.[21] Jeremy also performed with the Welsh harpist Gwendolen Mason.[22]

In 1929 he performed Ralph Vaughan Williams's Flos Campi at the Geneva Festival of the International Society for Contemporary Music.[23][24]

He made numerous recordings with a variety of ensembles including a recording in 1930 for the National Gramophonic Society of Paul Juon's Chamber Symphony Op. 27.[25]

Jeremy taught in the 1920s at the Editha Knocker School of Violin Playing[26] and was, throughout the 1930s, a professor at the Royal Academy of Music and an examiner for their Licentiate examinations.[27][28][29] He received the Fellowship of the Royal Academy of Music (FRAM) in 1935.[30]

During the second world war, Jeremy performed in a number of concerts for the wartime Council for the Encouragement of Music and the Arts (CEMA), the precursor to the Arts Council.[31]

In his later years, he was professor of Violin and Viola at Aberystwyth College from where he retired in 1958.[23]

The conductor and composer Eugene Goossens dedicated the second movement of his String Quartet (Op.14) to Jeremy. The other movements are dedicated to Arthur Beckwith and Cedric Sharpe, all members of the Philharmonic String Quartet who played alongside Goossens when he was the second violinist.[32][33]

Jeremy married Märta Vivika Norstrom in 1926 (she died in 1947) and they had one daughter, Nancy.[34]

Raymond Jeremy died in Aberystwyth in 1969, aged 78.[35]

References

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  1. ^ "An Elgar Triumph – First performance of new Quartet and Quintet". Daily News (London). 22 May 1919.
  2. ^ C., J. (October 1963). "Reviewed Work: The Williams Brothers by Anne Macnaghten". Music & Letters. 44 (4): 400.
  3. ^ "Academy Letter, Scholarships and Prize Competitions: Ada Lewis Scholarships - William Raymond Jeremy (Violin)". R. A. M. Club Magazine. 16. October 1905.
  4. ^ a b c d e f White, John (1997). An Anthology of British Viola Players. Colne, Lancashire: Comus Edition. p. 143. ISBN 095310690X.
  5. ^ "Academy Letter". R. A. M. Club Magazine. 28: 18. Nov 1909.
  6. ^ "Musical Association". The Musical Times. 48 (773): 472. July 1, 1907.
  7. ^ "Kutcher String Quartet's Concert". Dundee Evening Telegraph. 23 January 1937.
  8. ^ a b c d Cobbett, Walter Willson (1963). Cobbett's Cyclopedic Survey of Chamber Music. London: OUP.
  9. ^ "Chamber Music". Radio Times (205): 387. 2 September 1927.
  10. ^ "Annual Report for 1931". R. A. M. Club Magazine. 92: 10. March 1932.
  11. ^ "Musical Treat at Forfar". Dundee Courier. 28 October 1926.
  12. ^ "BBC Programmes". Londonderry Sentinel. 1 June 1935.
  13. ^ "Back Matter". The Musical Times. 56 (863): 52. January 1, 1915.
  14. ^ "Radio Programmes". Leicester Evening Mail. 6 March 1931.
  15. ^ "English Quartet for Spain". Sheffield Daily Telegraph. 29 January 1915.
  16. ^ "Stratton String Quartet". Sunday Post. 14 April 1935.
  17. ^ K., A. (22 May 1919). "AN ELGAR TRIUMPH. First Performance of New Quartet and Quintet". Daily News (London).
  18. ^ "The Late Lady Elgar". The Musical Times. 61 (927): 331. May 1, 1920.
  19. ^ "London Concerts". The Musical Times. 66 (983): 64. January 1, 1925.
  20. ^ "Wigmore Hall". Westminster Gazette. 29 November 1924.
  21. ^ W.R., A. (20 April 1935). "Bournemouth Musical Society". Bournemouth Graphic.
  22. ^ "A recital". Radio Times (724): 22. 15 August 1937.
  23. ^ a b "Obituary". The Musical Times. 110 (1515): 524. May 1969.
  24. ^ Evans, Edwin (May 1, 1929). "Geneva Festival". The Musical Times. 70 (1035): 432–440. doi:10.2307/915256. JSTOR 915256.
  25. ^ "Gramophone Notes". The Musical Times. 71 (1048): 524. June 1, 1930.
  26. ^ "Editha Knocker School of Violin Playing". The Musical Times. 68 (1017): 991. November 1, 1927.
  27. ^ "Front Matter". The Musical Times. 74 (1081): 196. March 1933.
  28. ^ "Front Matter". The Musical Times. 78 (1132): 483. June 1937.
  29. ^ "Mr Raymond Jeremy, FRAM". Western Mail. 15 September 1943.
  30. ^ RAM Honours Database, RAM Library Archive
  31. ^ "CEMA Grand Concert". Rhos Herald. 18 September 1943.
  32. ^ Evans, Edwin (July 1, 1919). "Modern British Composers. IV. Eugène Goossens (Continued)". The Musical Times. 60 (917): 331.
  33. ^ "Chamber Music". Radio Times. 206: 418. 9 Sep 1927.
  34. ^ Sweden, Indexed Marriage Records, 1860-1943
  35. ^ "Obituary - Raymond Jeremy". The Musical Times. 110 (1515): 524. May 1969.
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