Kenneth Alwyn


Kenneth Alwyn Wetherell was a British conductor, composer, and writer. Described by BBC Radio 3 as "one of the great British musical directors", Alwyn was known for his many recordings, including with the London Symphony Orchestra on Decca's first stereophonic recording of Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture. He was also known for his long association with BBC Radio 2's orchestral live music programme Friday Night is Music Night, appearing for thirty years as a conductor and presenter, and for his contribution to British musical theatre as a prolific musical director in the 1950s and 1960s. He was a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Music and married the actress Mary Law in 1960. His website and the first volume of his memoirs A Baton in the Ballet and Other Places were both published in 2015. The second volume Is Anyone Watching? was published in 2017.

Early life, wartime service and education

Alwyn was born Kenneth Alwyn Wetherell in Croydon, England, and attended the John Ruskin Boys' Central School. After wartime service with the Royal Air Force, Alwyn joined the Royal Academy of Music, where he studied singing, viola and organ and won the Manns Memorial Prize for conducting in 1952. He was the Sub-Professor of Organ and opera coach and founded the RAM Madrigal Choir. He did not use his surname during his career, and was instead credited as Kenneth Alwyn; this originated during his time at RAM, when he credited himself as such due to a rule which banned current students from performing professionally.
After a period as a Colonial Officer working with Radio Malaya in Singapore and a post as conductor with the Royal Wellington Choral Union in Wellington, New Zealand, in 1952, Alwyn returned to England.

Career

The Royal Ballet, Covent Garden

In 1952 Alwyn joined the Sadler's Wells Theatre Ballet as a conductor. In 1957, he moved to the Royal Ballet at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, where he shared the rostrum with Malcolm Sargent, Ernest Ansermet, Arthur Bliss, William Walton, Hans Werner Henze and Benjamin Britten, from whom he took over Britten's original production of The Prince of the Pagodas. It received its premiere on 1 January 1957. Alwyn also served as musical director of the Western Theatre Ballet from 1967 to 1969.

Conducting tours

Alwyn toured extensively in Europe, North America, South Africa and the Far East. As principal conductor of the Yomiuri Nippon Symphony Orchestra in the 1960s, Alwyn conducted the first performance in Japan of Gustav Holst's The Planets, and introduced other British works to Japanese audiences.

BBC radio and television career

In 1958, the BBC invited Alwyn to conduct the BBC Concert Orchestra, marking the beginning of a long association between Alwyn and the BBC as a conductor and presenter of programmes including Friday Night is Music Night. Alwyn worked with all of the BBC's orchestras, serving as Associate conductor of the BBC Concert Orchestra and, from 1969, as Principal conductor of the BBC Northern Ireland Orchestra. He also served on the BBC Music Advisory Committee.
Alwyn presented the BBC TV series The Orchestra, conducting the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. The series culminated in a performance of Benjamin Britten's Let's Make an Opera and was part of a pioneering educational movement, led by John Hosier, to teach music in schools through the medium of television. Alwyn also presented a BBC Omnibus documentary on the music of Tchaikovsky, directed by Sir John Drummond.
Alwyn's friendship with the comedian Dudley Moore led to a collaboration for Moore's final UK concert tour in March 1992. Alwyn conducted the BBC Concert Orchestra for a series of performances with Moore at the piano. These included a series of concerts at the Royal Albert Hall, London, broadcast live on BBC Radio 4 and later released on CD under the title Live from an Aircraft Hangar. Music from Moore's 1992 tour with Alwyn also featured in a BBC Radio 2 programme celebrating 60 years of the BBC Concert Orchestra, broadcast on 2 March 2012. Alwyn's friendship and stage performances with another popular British comic, Bob Monkhouse, are chronicled in Monkhouse's autobiography Crying with Laughter: My Life Story.

Musical theatre

To mark the year of his 80th birthday, Alwyn was interviewed by Edward Seckerson for BBC Radio 3's programme Stage and Screen, broadcast on 21 November 2005. The programme notes record that "Alwyn's career has encompassed many of the highlights of post-war British musical theatre". Working frequently with Gordon Langford as orchestrator, Alwyn served as musical director for the premieres of many Broadway and original British musicals, including the following productions:
Alwyn made original cast recordings of all of the above shows and also made studio cast recordings of the following musicals:
Alwyn served as musical director for a production of the pantomime Dick Whittington at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre in 1955 starring Peter O'Toole. In recognition of his contribution to the world of British musical theatre, Alwyn and the Alwyn Concert Orchestra were invited to perform at the memorial service for Noël Coward, which was held in Westminster Abbey on 28 March 1984 in the presence of Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother.

Orchestral recordings

Alwyn's orchestral recording career dates back to 1958, when he recorded Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture for Decca Records with the London Symphony Orchestra and the Band of the Grenadier Guards, which has been reviewed and critically acclaimed many times over the years in Gramophone magazine. and was chosen as one of its records of the year. The recording famously featured slowed-down gunshots to mimic cannon fire. It has remained a mainstay of the classical catalogue and was re-issued by Decca in 2012. Other notable recordings include Lord Berners' Wedding Bouquet with the RTÉ Chamber Choir and Sinfonietta.
Selected discography:
  • Richard Addinsell: Warsaw Concerto / Hubert Bath: Cornish Rhapsody / Miklós Rózsa: Spellbound Concerto / Charles Williams: The Dream of Olwen / George Gershwin: Rhapsody in Blue with Daniel Adni and the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra
  • Paul Ben-Haim: Symphony No. 1 with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
  • Ben-Haim: Symphony No. 2, Op. 36 / Concerto for Strings, Op. 40 with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
  • Lord Berners: Wedding Bouquet / Luna Park / March with the RTÉ Chamber Choir and Sinfonietta
  • Jeremiah Clarke: Trumpet Voluntary with the Trumpeters of Kneller Hall, the Royal Military School and London Symphony Orchestra, recorded at the Opening Concert of the Aldeburgh Festival in 1953, at which Benjamin Britten and Imogen Holst also conducted works appearing on the same recording
  • Samuel Coleridge-Taylor: Hiawatha's Wedding Feast with Anthony Rolfe Johnson, the Bournemouth Symphony Chorus and the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra
  • Coleridge-Taylor: The Song of Hiawatha / Symphonic Variations on an African Air with Bryn Terfel, Helen Field and the Welsh National Opera
  • George Gershwin: Rhapsody in Blue / An American in Paris / Piano Concerto in F with Malcolm Binns and the Sinfonia of London Orchestra
  • Edvard Grieg: Peer Gynt - Suite No. 1 / Rossini: Overtures with the London Philharmonic Orchestra and New Symphony Orchestra of London
  • Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky: 1812 Overture / Capriccio italien / Marche Slave / Swan Lake with the London Symphony Orchestra and London Philharmonic Orchestra

    Film music recordings

Alwyn's recording of The Ladykillers: Music from Those Glorious Ealing Films with the Royal Ballet Sinfonia won the 1998 Gramophone Award for Best Film Music Recording, and a selection of Richard Addinsell's film music entitled British Light Music with the BBC Concert Orchestra was chosen as a record of the year by Gramophone magazine. A collection of main themes and excerpts from famous film scores, including The Last of the Mohicans, The English Patient and Sense and Sensibility was also selected as a recording of the year by the magazine in 1998. Alwyn's wide interest in film music of all genres has led him to re-record many popular film scores, including The Bride of Frankenstein for which he received particular acclaim: "Shaped by Kenneth Alwyn with an admirable feel for the music's full-blooded style, and graced with a tight, bright recording which gives the orchestra an authentic film studio sound, this could almost be the original film soundtrack in modern digital dressing."
Selected discography:
  • Addinsell: British Light Music: Goodbye Mr Chips / A Tale of Two Cities / Fire Over England / Tom Brown's Schooldays / The Prince and the Showgirl / Festival with the BBC Concert Orchestra
  • Addinsell: Music of Richard Addinsell including Warsaw Concerto with the Royal Ballet Sinfonia
  • Addinsell: Film Music with Peter Lawson and the Royal Ballet Sinfonia
  • Auric and others: The Ladykillers: Music from Those Glorious Ealing Films with the Royal Ballet Sinfonia
  • Bax and Arnold: Music for Films: Oliver Twist / Malta GC / The Sound Barrier: Rhapsody for Orchestra, Op.38 with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
  • Newman: Man of Galilee: The Essential Alfred Newman Film Music Collection
  • Rozsa: Ben-Hur: The Essential Miklos Rozsa with the City of Prague Philharmonic Orchestra
  • Morricone: Once Upon a Time: The Essential Ennio Morricone Film Music Collection
  • Schurmann and others: Horror! with the Westminster Philharmonic Orchestra
  • Steiner: The Flame and the Arrow: Classic Film Music with the City of Prague Philharmonic Orchestra
  • Steiner: Gone with the Wind: The Classic Max Steiner
  • Steiner and others: Cinema Century
  • Vaughan Williams: Coastal Command / Bliss: Conquest of the Air / Schurmann: Attack & Celebration / Easdale: The Red Shoes with the Philharmonia Orchestra
  • Waxman: The Bride of Frankenstein / The Invisible Ray with the Westminster Philharmonic Orchestra
  • Young: The Quiet Man with the Dublin Screen Orchestra
  • Various: Best of British Light Music with the BBC Concert Orchestra and others
  • Various: Cinema's Classic Romances with the City of Prague Philharmonic Orchestra