Antoinette Kirkwood (26 February 1930 - 28 January 2014) was an English composer born in London, with Irish family connections.[1] She studied with Claud Biggs at the Irish Academy of Music and then piano and composition with Dorothy Howell and cello with Paul Tortelier at the Royal Academy of Music.[2] She often accompanied her mother, the soprano Rome Lindsay.[3] Radio Éireann broadcast her Symphony, op 8, composed in 1953.[2] This "very notable achievement", said one unidentified reviewer, established that Kirkwood "can write a memorable tune in a definite key and can hold the listener’s interest for a considerable time".[4] On 28 April 1960 the conductor Kathleen Merritt organized and conducted a Wigmore Hall concert of 'Contemporary British Women Composers', featuring the music of Kirkwood alongside Ina Boyle, Ruth Gipps, Dorothy Howell, Elizabeth Maconchy and Grace Williams.[5]

Kirkwood was the founder and conductor of the St Columba's Orchestra (associated with the London church) from 1957 until 1961. For four years beginning in 1969, she was a member of the executive committee of the Composers' Guild of Great Britain.

She married the writer Richard Phibbs (1911-1986, author of Buried in the Country, 1947) in 1961 at St Columba's.[6][7] Her marriage, three children and caring for her mother and husband through their terminal illnesses, led to a complete cessation in her composition activity between 1961 and the late 1980s.[1] During that period they were living at 56 Sutherland Street, London SW1.[8]

On her husband's death in 1986 she raised money to re-publish two of his books (Cockle Button, Cockle Ben, for children, and Harmony Hill, four short stories), as well as resuming her own career as a composer.[9] She died on 28 January 2014, aged 84.[10]

Works

Kirkwood composed orchestral concert works, theatre music and two ballet scores, as well as instrumental and chamber pieces (including a cello sonata and the Rapsodie for harp) and many songs. Marie Fitzpatrick identifies a development in her style from the three folksong based orchestral Fantasies (1958-61), through the six Intermezzos for piano of 1959, showing the influence of Bartok, and also including more technically demanding explorations, such as the Soliloquy for guitar (1985).[11] Her publishers are Curlew & Andresier and Bardic Edition. Selected works include:

Orchestral

  • Symphony No. 1, op. 8 (1953, recording at the British Music Collection[12]
  • Alessandro, op. 12 - (1957, music drama after the book by Gerard McLarnon)
  • Musa the Saint, op. 16 - (1958, ballet after the book by Antoinette Kirkwood)
  • Fantasia No. 1 for orchestra, op. 13 (1958)
  • Fantasia No. 2, op. 14 (on an old Irish reel)
  • Fantasia No. 3, op. 18 (1961, on a old Sligo tune)
  • Suite for String Orchestra, op. 5 (1960)[13]
  • The Empty Stable, op. 10 - Incidental music
  • Unhallowed, op. 4 - Incidental music

Chamber and instrumental

  • Cello Sonata, op. 6 (1950)
  • Six Intermezzi for piano (1959)
  • Petite Suite, op. 20 No. 2 for Guitar
  • Rapsodie No. 1, op. 21 No. 4 for Viola and Guitar
  • Soliloquy, op. 19 No. 3 for Guitar (1985)
  • Largo, op. 17 No. 1 for Flute and Piano
  • Rapsodie, op. 19 No. 2 for Harp solo
  • Sleepy Waters in the Moonlight, for 2 Violins and Violoncello
  • Sonatina, op. 2 No. 1, piano (1946)
  • Nocturne, op. 2 No. 2, piano

Vocal

  • Carol, SATB and piano
  • The Fly, op. 7 No. 1 (William Blake)
  • The Barrel Organ, op. 7 No. 5 (Michael Ashe)
  • Must she go?, op. 9 No. 1 (James Forsyth)
  • Morning in Bengal, op. 9 No. 2 (Anthony Hayward)
  • The Tourney, op. 9 No. 3 (Anthony Hayward)
  • Remorse, op. 9 No. 4 (Michael O'Hagan)
  • The Song of the Fisherman of Cacru, op. 11 No. 3 (James Forsyth)
  • The Oyster-Catcher’s Song, op. 11 No. 4 (James Forsyth)
  • Der Schiffbrüchige, op. 15 (Heinrich Heine)
  • Krönung, op. 17 No. 2 (Heinrich Heine) High Voice and Strings[3][4][14]

A few of her works have been recorded and issued on media, including:

  • Six Intermezzi[15]
  • Sonata for Violoncello and Piano[16]
  • Women Composers - Vol. I CD
  • Women Composers - Vol. II CD[4]

References

  1. 1 2 Halstead, Jill (June 1997). The woman composer: creativity and the gendered politics of music composition. Scolar Pr. p. 300. ISBN 1-85928-183-4. ISBN 978-1-85928-183-3
  2. 1 2 Contemporary Music Review, Vol. 11 Parts 1 and 2, pp. 177-8
  3. 1 2 Lazarus, Emma; Heine, Heinrich (1881). Antoinette Kirkwood biography. New York: Worthington/University of Massachusetts Amherst. Retrieved 2 February 2012.
  4. 1 2 3 "Antoinette Kirkwood". Bardic Music. Archived from the original on 3 March 2012. Retrieved 2 February 2012.
  5. ↑ 'London Concerts: Six Women Composers', in The Musical Times, Vol. 101, No. 1408, June 1960, pp. 373-374
  6. ↑ Sadie, Julie Anne; Samuel, Rhian (1994). The Norton/Grove dictionary of women composers. New York: W.W. Norton. p. 250 . ISBN 0-393-03487-9.
  7. ↑ The Times 24 July 1961, p. 12
  8. ↑ Who's Who in Music, 5th ed. (1969), p. 173
  9. ↑ Helen Reid. 'For the Love of Richard', Western Daily Press, 1 August 1988, p. 8
  10. ↑ "Antoinette Kirkwood". Bardic Music. Archived from the original on 3 March 2012. Retrieved 24 December 2010.
  11. ↑ Marie Fitzpatrick . 'Kirkwood, Antoinette' in Grove Music Online (2001, rev. 2023)
  12. ↑ "Symphony no. 1". British Music Collection. 17 April 2009.
  13. ↑ 'Six Women Composers', The Musical Times, Vol. 101, No. 1408 (June 1960), pp. 373-4
  14. ↑ "Scores by Antoinette Kirkwood". The Collection. Arts Council England. Archived from the original on 19 July 2012. Retrieved 3 February 2012.
  15. ↑ Included on A Potpourri of Piano Music, Catherine Nardiello, piano, Cassette CN-105
  16. ↑ extract performed by Gemma Christine Connor

Further reading

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