Gordon Jacob facts for kids

Gordon Jacob (born July 5, 1895 – died June 8, 1984) was a famous English composer and teacher. He taught music at the Royal College of Music in London for many years, from 1924 until 1966. Gordon Jacob wrote over 700 pieces of music! Most of these were his own original works. He also created new versions of other composers' music for orchestras. He arranged music by famous composers like William Byrd and Edward Elgar.

Life and Career

Gordon Jacob was born in Upper Norwood, London. He was the seventh son and the youngest of ten children. His father, Stephen Jacob, worked in India and died when Gordon was only three years old. One of his older brothers, Archibald Jacob, was also a musician.

Early Life and War Experience

Gordon Jacob went to school at Dulwich College. When World War I started, he joined the army. He became a prisoner of war in 1917. While in the prison camp, he found a harmony textbook and started learning about music composition. He even wrote music for an orchestra made up of his fellow prisoners. They used whatever instruments they could find.

After the war, he first studied journalism. But soon, he decided to focus on music. He took a special course and was accepted as a student at the Royal College of Music (RCM) in 1920. There, he learned from very important teachers. These included Charles Villiers Stanford and Ralph Vaughan Williams for composition. He also studied music theory with Herbert Howells and conducting with Adrian Boult.

Teaching and Writing

In 1924, after finishing his studies, Gordon Jacob became a music teacher. He taught at the RCM until he retired in 1966. He was a professor of music theory, composition, and orchestration. Orchestration is the art of arranging music for an orchestra. Many of his students became famous composers themselves. Some of them were Malcolm Arnold, Ruth Gipps, and Joseph Horovitz.

Besides teaching, he also examined music students. From 1947 to 1957, he edited music scores for Penguin Books. He wrote articles for music magazines and for Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians. He also wrote four books about music:

• Orchestral Technique, a Manual for Students (1931)
• How to Read a Score (1944)
• The Composer and his Art (1955)
• The Elements of Orchestration (1962)

Later Years and Challenges

In 1959, a TV show about Gordon Jacob was made by Ken Russell. In the 1960s, the BBC (a big British broadcasting company) started playing less music by composers like Jacob. This was because they preferred a different style of music. Many composers earned money from their music being played on the radio. So, Jacob and others like him faced financial challenges.

Luckily, Gordon Jacob received many requests for new music from the United States. His music was very popular with university wind bands there. He continued writing music until shortly before he passed away.

Gordon Jacob was married twice. He had a son and a daughter from his second marriage. He died at his home in Saffron Walden, England, in 1984. He was 88 years old.

Awards and Honours

Gordon Jacob received several important awards and honours throughout his life:

• He won the Arthur Sullivan composition prize while he was a student.
• He earned a doctorate degree in music from the University of London in 1935.
• He became a Fellow of the Royal College of Music in 1946.
• He was made an honorary Fellow of the Royal Academy of Music in 1947.
• In 1968, he was appointed a CBE, which is a special honour from the Queen.

Music

Gordon Jacob was a very productive composer. He wrote a lot of music!

Compositions

Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians lists 16 concertos by him. A concerto is a piece of music for a solo instrument and an orchestra. His concertos were for many different instruments, even unusual ones like the trombone and timpani (kettledrums). A website about Jacob lists over 700 original pieces or arrangements.

His music was influenced more by French and Russian composers from the early 1900s. People noted that his music had clear structures. His writing for instruments showed that he knew what each instrument could do best. One newspaper review in 1939 described his work as "Good, but a little dry."

In the 1920s and 1930s, Jacob wrote music for choirs and school groups. This helped him earn money while he worked on bigger pieces. Some of his important early works include:

• A viola concerto (1926)
• A piano concerto (1927)
• His First Symphony (1929), which he dedicated to his brother who died in World War I.

Later, in the 1930s, he wrote an oboe concerto for Léon Goossens (1935). He also composed Variations on an Original Theme (1937).

Gordon Jacob also wrote music for the Sadler's Wells Ballet Company. His ballet Uncle Remus (1934) was an original work for them. During World War II, he wrote music for several propaganda films. After the war, he composed the music for the film Esther Waters (1948). His Symphony for Strings (1943) was a more serious piece about the war.

His Second Symphony was first played in 1946. One reviewer thought it was "perhaps the most stimulating work" he had written. It had strong feelings, from exciting and romantic parts to sad and angry sections. In 1951, the year of the Festival of Britain, he created four new works:

• Music for a Festival (for brass and military bands)
• Concertos for flute and horn
• The cantata A Goodly Heritage

In his later years, Jacob wrote music for a play based on the biblical Book of Job. This was performed at a festival and later broadcast by the BBC.

Arrangements

One of Gordon Jacob's first big successes was the William Byrd Suite. He wrote this for orchestra while he was a student. It was based on old music from the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book. The famous conductor Adrian Boult led the first performance in 1923. Critics praised it as a "brilliant piece of adaptation."

Many of Jacob's ballet scores were arrangements of existing music. This means he took music by other composers and changed it for a ballet. Examples include:

• Les Sylphides (1932), using music by Chopin.
• Carnival (1932), using music by Schumann.
• Apparitions (1936), using music by Liszt.
• Mam'zelle Angot (1947), using music by Lecocq.

In 1958, he orchestrated a work by Noël Coward called London Morning. In 1968, he re-orchestrated the music for Frederick Ashton's ballet Marguerite and Armand.

During World War II, Jacob arranged popular songs for a BBC comedy show called ITMA. After the war, he arranged Edward Elgar's Organ Sonata for orchestra (1946). This version was later recorded and praised.

Gordon Jacob's special arrangement of the national anthem (with lots of trumpets!) was used for the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953. It was also used for her funeral in 2022 and for the coronation of Charles III and Camilla in 2023.

Recordings

There are over eighty recordings of Gordon Jacob's music. These include his own original works and his arrangements of other composers' music. You can find recordings of his symphonies, concertos for many different instruments, and chamber music.

Partial List of Works

• William Byrd Suite (1922)
• Concerto for Viola and Orchestra (1925)
• Concerto for Piano and Strings (1927)
• Symphony No. 1 (1928–9)
• Concerto for Oboe and Strings (1933)
• Uncle Remus (1934), a ballet
• Symphony for Strings (1943)
• Symphony No. 2 (1945)
• Concerto for Bassoon, Strings, and Percussion (1947)
• Music for a Festival (1951), for concert band
• Concerto for Horn and Strings (1951)
• Concerto for Flute and Strings (1952)
• Concerto for Violin and Strings (1954)
• Concerto for Cello and Strings (1955)
• Concerto for Trombone and Orchestra (1955)
• Oboe Concerto No. 2 (1956)
• Piano Concerto No. 2 (1957)
• Old Wine in New Bottles (1958), for wind ensemble
• The Barber of Seville Goes to the Devil (1960), a funny piece for orchestra
• York Symphony (1970), for brass band
• Suite for Tuba and Strings (1972)
• Fantasia for Euphonium and Wind Band (1974)
• Concerto for Timpani and Wind Band (1984)

Books

• Orchestral Technique (1931)
• How to Read a Score (1944)
• The Composer and his Art (1955)
• The Elements of Orchestration (1962)

See also

In Spanish: Gordon Jacob para niños

• Gordon Jacob, a 1959 short British film about Gordon Jacob by Ken Russell