Antoinette Millicent Hedley Anderson (1907 – 1990) was an English

singer Singing is the act of creating musical sounds with the voice. A person who sings is called a singer, artist or vocalist (in jazz and/or popular music). Singers perform music (arias, recitatives, songs, etc.) that can be sung with or withou ...

and

actor An actor or actress is a person who portrays a character in a performance. The actor performs "in the flesh" in the traditional medium of the theatre or in modern media such as film, radio, and television. The analogous Greek term is (), li ...

. Known as Hedli Anderson, she studied singing in England and Germany before returning to

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

in 1934. Anderson joined the Group Theatre, and performed in

cabaret Cabaret is a form of theatrical entertainment featuring music, song, dance, recitation, or drama. The performance venue might be a pub, a casino, a hotel, a restaurant, or a nightclub with a stage for performances. The audience, often dining o ...

and in the initial productions of plays by

W. H. Auden Wystan Hugh Auden (; 21 February 1907 – 29 September 1973) was a British-American poet. Auden's poetry was noted for its stylistic and technical achievement, its engagement with politics, morals, love, and religion, and its variety in ...

, Christopher Isherwood and Louis MacNeice. She married MacNeice in 1942; the couple had one daughter. They separated in 1960. Among the composers and lyricists who wrote songs for her were Auden, MacNeice,

Benjamin Britten Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten (22 November 1913 – 4 December 1976, aged 63) was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He was a central figure of 20th-century British music, with a range of works including opera, other ...

Elisabeth Lutyens Agnes Elisabeth Lutyens, CBE (9 July 190614 April 1983) was an English composer. Early life and education Elisabeth Lutyens was born in London on 9 July 1906. She was one of the five children of Lady Emily Bulwer-Lytton (1874–1964), a me ...

and

William Alwyn William Alwyn (born William Alwyn Smith; 7 November 1905 – 11 September 1985), was an English composer, conductor, and music teacher. Life and music William Alwyn was born William Alwyn Smith in Northampton, the son of Ada Tyler (Tompkins ...

. Auden's "

Funeral Blues "Funeral Blues", or "Stop all the clocks", is a poem by W. H. Auden which first appeared in the 1936 play ''The Ascent of F6''. Auden substantially rewrote the poem several years later as a cabaret song for the singer Hedli Anderson. Both versi ...

" (also known as "Stop all the clocks", later to become famous through its use in the film ''

Four Weddings and a Funeral ''Four Weddings and a Funeral'' is a 1994 British romantic comedy film directed by Mike Newell. It is the first of several films by screenwriter Richard Curtis to feature Hugh Grant, and follows the adventures of Charles (Grant) and his circle ...

'') was originally written for Anderson and set to music by Britten as part of Auden and Isherwood's play ''

The Ascent of F6 ''The Ascent of F6: A Tragedy in Two Acts'', by W. H. Auden and Christopher Isherwood, was the second and most successful play in the Auden-Isherwood collaboration, first published in 1936. It was a major contribution to English poetic drama in ...

'' (1936), then revised by Auden as a separate poem. In later years she owned, and cooked in, the Spinnaker restaurant in Scilly,

Kinsale Kinsale ( ; ) is a historic port and fishing town in County Cork, Ireland. Located approximately south of Cork City on the southeast coast near the Old Head of Kinsale, it sits at the mouth of the River Bandon, and has a population of 5,281 (a ...

, County Cork, which specialised in seafood and Mediterranean and North African food.

References

External links

* 1907 births 1990 deaths English stage actresses 20th-century English actresses 20th-century English women singers 20th-century English singers British expatriates in Germany {{England-actor-stub