1926 In British Music

This is a summary of 1926 in music in the United Kingdom.

Events

* c. May – Socialist composer Rutland Boughton stages a performance of his Nativity opera ''Bethlehem'' (1915) at Church House, Westminster, in a staging explicitly referencing the 1926 United Kingdom general strike.
*6 May – In the midst of the General Strike, a concert of Leos Janácek's work is held at the Wigmore Hall, attended by the composer himself.Music and History: 1926
. Accessed 28 January 2016
* 20 October – Ethel Smyth's opera ''Entente Cordiale'' receives its first public stage performance in Bristol, having been premièred by students at the Royal College of Music the previous year.
*November – Gertrude Lawrence becomes the first British performer to star in a US musical on Broadway, starring in ''Oh, Kay!''.
*8 December – The premiere of Dame Ethel Smyth's Sonata in A minor for cello and piano is held in London, nearly 40 years after the work was composed.
*14 December – The mother of teenage composer Benjamin Britten brings his work to the attention of Charles Macpherson.
*17 December – Composer John Ireland marries Dorothy Phillips, thirty years his junior, at Chelsea Register Office.
*26 December – Granville Bantock's incidental music for ''Macbeth'' is used for the first time, in a production at the Prince Theatre, London, starring Sybil Thorndike.
*''date unknown''
**Operatic baritone Leslie Rands marries his D'Oyly Carte co-star Marjorie Eyre.
**Eugène Goossens, fils, joins the British National Opera Company as a conductor.
**Sir Walford Davies resigns his professorship at University College, Aberystwyth.
**The Webber Douglas School of Singing and Dramatic Art is founded by Walter Johnstone Douglas and Amherst Webber in London.
**Organist and composer Herbert Brewer receives a knighthood.

Popular music

*Eric Coates – "By The Tamarisk"

Classical music: new works

* Arnold Bax – Symphony No. 2 in E minor and C major
* Rutland Boughton – ''The Queen of Cornwall'', overture
* John Ireland – '' Three Songs, 1926''
* Ralph Vaughan Williams
**''On Christmas Night'' (ballet)
** Piano Concerto in C (movements 1 and 2)
*'' Six Studies in English Folk Song''
* Gerald Tyrwhitt – ''The Triumph of Neptune'' (ballet)
* Peter Warlock – ''Capriol Suite''

Opera

*Ernest Bryson – ''The Leper’s Flute'', with libretto by Ian Colvin

Musical theatre

*May – ''Yvonne'' by Percy Greenbank, Jean Gilbert and Vernon Dukelsky, opens at Daly's Theatre, London.

Births

*3 January – Sir George Martin, record producer (died 2016)
*21 January – Brian Brockless, organist, composer, and conductor (died 1995)
*11 February – Alexander Gibson, conductor and founder of the Scottish Opera (died 1995)
*20 February – Gillian Lynne, choreographer (died 2018)
*14 March – Lita Roza, singer (died 2006)
* May — Duncan Campbell, trumpeter
*2 July – Morag Beaton, operatic soprano (died 2010)
*18 July – Bryan Johnson, singer (died 1995)
*17 August – George Melly, jazz singer (died 2007)
*17 November – Robert Earl, singer
* 30 December – Stan Tracey, jazz pianist and composer (died 2013)

Deaths

*8 June – John Hornsey Casson, hymn-tune composer, 82''Dictionary of Composers for the Church in Great Britain and Ireland''
Accessed 28 January 2016
*12 July – Charles Wood, composer, 60
*2 November – John Le Hay, Irish-born musical comedy performer, 72
*4 November – Robert Newman, co-founder of the Proms, 68

See also

* 1926 in the United Kingdom
* List of British films of 1926

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:1926 In British Music
British Music, 1926 in
Music
British music by year
1920s in British music