Lennox Berkeley

From ChoralWiki

Some or all of the works by this composer are subject to copyright, and not available on CPDL.
You may be able to purchase the music from Sheet Music Plus, with which CPDL is affiliated (8% of every sale is given back to CPDL which helps with hosting costs).

Life

Born: 12 May 1903

Died: 26 December 1989

Biography

Sir Lennox Randal Francis Berkeley was an English composer. He was born in Oxford, England, and educated at the Dragon School, Gresham's School and Merton College, Oxford. In 1927, he went to Paris to study music with Nadia Boulanger, and there he became acquainted with Francis Poulenc, Igor Stravinsky, Darius Milhaud, Arthur Honegger and Albert Roussel. The French influence would continue to be felt in his music. He worked for the BBC during the Second World War, and later became president of the Performing Rights Society. He was knighted in 1974. He held the chair of Professor of Composition at the Royal Academy of Music from 1946 to 1968, and his pupils there included Richard Rodney Bennett, David Bedford and John Tavener. He enjoyed a long association with Benjamin Britten, another old boy of Gresham's School, with whom he collaborated on a number of works. In later years, his adoption of serialism marked a darker and more brooding style.

His son, Michael Berkeley, is also a composer.

View Wikipedia article for Lennox Berkeley.