Conductor, Composer, Pianist. A fine Irish composer of the early 20th Century, his music is infrequently heard today and he is best remembered for leading some of England's greatest orchestras. Born Herbert Hamilton Harty in Hillsborough, County Down, he studied with his father, the village organist, and at the Royal Irish Academy of Music. In London from 1901, he first won fame as a brilliant piano accompanist for such performers as tenor John McCormick, violinists Joseph Szigeti and Fritz Kreisler, and soprano Agnes Nicholls. He married Nicholls in 1904. Most of his important music was composed before World War I: the "Irish Symphony" (1904), "Comedy Overture" (1906), a Violin Concerto (written for Szigeti, 1909), the tone poem "With the Wild Geese" (1910), "Variations on a Dublin Air" (1913), and the cantata "The Mystic Trumpeter" (1913), to a poem by Walt Whitman. Following war service as a lieutenant with the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve, he concentrated on conducting. Harty was music director of the Halle Orchestra from 1920 to 1933 and of the London Symphony Orchestra from 1932 to 1935. During that time he earned a reputation as a Berlioz specialist and gave the world premieres of Constant Lambert's "The Rio Grande" (1929) and William Walton's Symphony No. 1 (minus the incomplete last movement, 1934), as well as the English premieres of Mahler's Ninth and Shostakovich's First symphonies. In 1936 Harty was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor, which cost him an eye and limited the rest of his career to occasional performances as a guest conductor. He was knighted in 1925.
Conductor, Composer, Pianist. A fine Irish composer of the early 20th Century, his music is infrequently heard today and he is best remembered for leading some of England's greatest orchestras. Born Herbert Hamilton Harty in Hillsborough, County Down, he studied with his father, the village organist, and at the Royal Irish Academy of Music. In London from 1901, he first won fame as a brilliant piano accompanist for such performers as tenor John McCormick, violinists Joseph Szigeti and Fritz Kreisler, and soprano Agnes Nicholls. He married Nicholls in 1904. Most of his important music was composed before World War I: the "Irish Symphony" (1904), "Comedy Overture" (1906), a Violin Concerto (written for Szigeti, 1909), the tone poem "With the Wild Geese" (1910), "Variations on a Dublin Air" (1913), and the cantata "The Mystic Trumpeter" (1913), to a poem by Walt Whitman. Following war service as a lieutenant with the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve, he concentrated on conducting. Harty was music director of the Halle Orchestra from 1920 to 1933 and of the London Symphony Orchestra from 1932 to 1935. During that time he earned a reputation as a Berlioz specialist and gave the world premieres of Constant Lambert's "The Rio Grande" (1929) and William Walton's Symphony No. 1 (minus the incomplete last movement, 1934), as well as the English premieres of Mahler's Ninth and Shostakovich's First symphonies. In 1936 Harty was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor, which cost him an eye and limited the rest of his career to occasional performances as a guest conductor. He was knighted in 1925.
Bio by: Bobb Edwards
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