Kathleen Riddick (17 July 1907 - 5 February 1973) was a British musician, one of the first women in Britain to establish herself in the male-dominated profession of conducting. To do so at a time when it was "considered impossible" for a woman to become a conductor Riddick was initially obliged to found her own ensembles to lead. They included the Surrey Philharmonic Orchestra in 1932 (of which she was the conductor for 40 years), and the London Women's String Orchestra (later the Riddick Orchestra) in 1938. But she was also appeared as guest conductor of BBC orchestras and the

London Symphony Orchestra The London Symphony Orchestra (LSO) is a British symphony orchestra based in London. Founded in 1904, the LSO is the oldest of London's symphony orchestras. The LSO was created by a group of players who left Henry Wood's Queen's Hall Orc ...

Education and early career

She was born at

Epsom Epsom is the principal town of the Borough of Epsom and Ewell in Surrey, England, about south of central London. The town is first recorded as ''Ebesham'' in the 10th century and its name probably derives from that of a Saxon landowner. The ...

in Surrey into a musical family: both her parents were professional musicians and her father was the conductor of an amateur orchestra in Epsom. At the age of 10 she began studying cello at the Guildhall School of Music with Arnold Trowell (1887-1966), also taking composition courses. Her first professional engagements were as cellist for the Serre Trio (with Daphne Serre, piano, and Queenie Dyer, violin), which made regular BBC broadcasts in the early 1930s. In 1932 she also founded the Surrey String Players in Leatherhead, recruiting local amateurs. Later in the 1930s, Riddick gained a recommendation from Robert Jaffrey Forbes, principal of the

Royal Manchester College of Music The Royal Manchester College of Music (RMCM) was a tertiary level conservatoire in Manchester, north-west England. It was founded in 1893 by the German-born conductor Sir Charles Hallé in 1893. In 1972, the Royal Manchester College of Music ...

, to study conducting with

Nikolai Malko Nicolai Andreyevich Malko (russian: Никола́й Андре́евич Малько́, ua, Микола Андрійович Малько; 4 May 188323 June 1961) was a Russian-born American symphonic conductor. Biography Malko was born in ...

in Salzburg.

Orchestras

In 1945 the Surrey String Players became the semi-professional Surrey Philharmonic Orchestra. By May 1951 it had gained enough prestige to premiere

Gordon Jacob Gordon Percival Septimus Jacob CBE (5 July 18958 June 1984) was an English composer and teacher. He was a professor at the Royal College of Music in London from 1924 until his retirement in 1966, and published four books and many articles about ...

's Horn Concerto at the

Wigmore Hall Wigmore Hall is a concert hall located at 36 Wigmore Street, London. Originally called Bechstein Hall, it specialises in performances of chamber music, early music, vocal music and song recitals. It is widely regarded as one of the world's leadi ...

with soloist

Dennis Brain Dennis Brain (17 May 19211 September 1957) was a British horn player. From a musical family – his father and grandfather were horn players – he attended the Royal Academy of Music in London. During the Second World War he served in the Roya ...

and Jacob himself conducting. This was followed on 29 October 1951 with a concert at the recently opened Royal Festival Hall, including the premiere of Stanley Bate's ''Introduction and Allegro'', op 24, a work dedicated to Kathleen Riddick. She remained conductor of the Surrey Philharmonic for forty years until 1972, a year before her death. It is still playing today, conducted by Mark Fitz-Gerald, a student of

Norman Del Mar Norman René Del Mar CBE (31 July 19196 February 1994) was a British conductor, horn player, and biographer. As a conductor, he specialised in the music of late romantic composers; including Edward Elgar, Gustav Mahler, and Richard Strauss. H ...

.Surrey Philharmonic Orchestra website
/ref> Concurrently, Riddick founded a second, fully professional ensemble, the London Women's String Orchestra, which performed for the first time on 25 May 1938 at the Aeolian Hall, to very positive reviews. The programme included the challenging ''Music for Strings'' by

Arthur Bliss Sir Arthur Edward Drummond Bliss (2 August 189127 March 1975) was an English composer and conductor. Bliss's musical training was cut short by the First World War, in which he served with distinction in the army. In the post-war years he qu ...

. J A Westrup commented that "Riddick proved her worth by getting good results without any fuss or display. The absolute certainty of the ensemble was a sufficient tribute to her work at rehearsal". The orchestra engaged with contemporary composers, taking on UK and world premieres of music by Stanley Bate,

Henk Badings Henk Badings (hĕngk bä'dĭngz) (17 January 190726 June 1987) was an Indo-Dutch composer. Early life Born in Bandung, Java, Dutch East Indies, as the son of Herman Louis Johan Badings, an officer in the Dutch East Indies army, Hendrik Herman Ba ...

Arnold Cooke Arnold Atkinson Cooke (4 November 1906 – 13 August 2005) was a British composer.Biography by Eric Wetherell, British Music Society/ref> Education Cooke was born at Gomersal, West Yorkshire, into a family of carpet manufacturers. As a child, ...

Paul Hindemith Paul Hindemith (; 16 November 189528 December 1963) was a German composer, music theorist, teacher, violist and conductor. He founded the Amar Quartet in 1921, touring extensively in Europe. As a composer, he became a major advocate of the ' ...

, Bohuslav Martinů,

Alan Ridout Alan Ridout (9 December 1934 – 19 March 1996) was a British composer and teacher. Life Born in West Wickham, Kent, England, Alan Ridout studied briefly at the Guildhall School of Music before commencing four years of study at the Royal C ...

and others. The name was changed to the Riddick String Orchestra in 1944. It performed in regular concerts and BBC radio broadcasts from then until the early 1960s, sometimes under the baton of guest conductors. Other conducting engagements included guest appearances with the

BBC Symphony Orchestra The BBC Symphony Orchestra (BBC SO) is a British orchestra based in London. Founded in 1930, it was the first permanent salaried orchestra in London, and is the only one of the city's five major symphony orchestras not to be self-governing. T ...

(Bedford, 26 November 1943), the BBC Northern and BBC Scottish orchestras, as well as the London Symphony Orchestra.

Personal life and legacy

In 1934 Kathleen Riddick married the musician George Bixley (1905-1995) and they lived at 1 Fountain Cottages, The Street,

Ashtead Ashtead is a large village in the Mole Valley district of Surrey, England, approximately south of central London. Primarily a commuter settlement, Ashtead is on the single-carriageway A24 between Epsom and Leatherhead. The village is on ...

in Surrey. Their daughter, Susan Bixley, was born in 1944 and is still involved with the Surrey Philharmonic Orchestra today. Kathleen Riddick was awarded the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in

1961 Events January * January 3 ** United States President Dwight D. Eisenhower announces that the United States has severed diplomatic and consular relations with Cuba (Cuba–United States relations are restored in 2015). ** Aero Flight 311 (K ...

for services to music. Along with a very few predecessors (such as Florence Ashton Marshall, Gwynne Kimpton (1873–1930) and

Ethel Leginska Ethel Liggins (13 April 188626 February 1970) was a British pianist, conductor and composer. A student of Theodor Leschetizky, she became widely known as the ‘Paderewski of woman pianists’ and (from 1923) established herself as one of the fir ...

) and her near contemporaries Avril Coleridge-Taylor, Iris Lemare and Kathleen Merritt (1901-1985), Riddick was one of the pioneers who opened up the world of conducting to women musicians in Britain. She inspired

Ruth Gipps Ruth Dorothy Louisa ("Wid") Gipps (20 February 1921 – 23 February 1999) was an English composer, oboist, pianist, conductor, and educator. She composed music in a wide range of genres, including five symphonies, seven concertos, and nu ...

to begin her own conducting career. Like Riddick, all of these conductors also had to found their own orchestras in order to build up their reputations. (

Nadia Boulanger Juliette Nadia Boulanger (; 16 September 188722 October 1979) was a French music teacher and conductor. She taught many of the leading composers and musicians of the 20th century, and also performed occasionally as a pianist and organist. From a ...

was an exception: visiting from France in 1936, she became the first woman to conduct the London Philharmonic Orchestra).Brooks, Jeanice. 'Telling the Story of Nadia Boulanger's Conducting Career', in ''The Journal of Musicology'', Vol. 14, No. 1 (Winter, 1996), pp. 92-116
/ref>

Selected premiere performances

Malcolm Arnold Sir Malcolm Henry Arnold (21 October 1921 – 23 September 2006) was an English composer. His works feature music in many genres, including a cycle of nine symphonies, numerous concertos, concert works, chamber music, choral music and music ...

. ''Symphony for Strings'' op.13 (first performance 1947) *

. ''Largo and Allegro'' (first performance of string orchestra version, 1940) * Stanley Bate. ''Introduction and Allegro'' (first performance 1951). Concerto for piano and strings, op.24 (first performance 1939) *

Geoffrey Bush Geoffrey Bush (23 March 1920 – 24 February 1998) was a British composer, teacher and music scholar. Largely without formal training in composition, he produced a wide range of compositions across different genres, including many songs and wor ...

. ''Divertimento'' (first performance, 1947). ''Matthew Locke Suite'' (first performance, 1957) *

Hubert Clifford __NOTOC__ Hubert John Clifford (31 May 1904 – 4 September 1959) was an Australian-born British composer, conductor and musical director for films. A native of Bairnsdale in rural Victoria, he studied chemistry before taking up music at the Mel ...

. ''Serenade'' (first performance, 1947) *

. ''Passacaglia, Scherzo and Finale'' (premiere of string orchestra version, 1940) *

. ''Theme and Four Variations for piano and strings'' (first UK performance, 1947) *

. Horn Concerto (first performance, 1951). ''Symphony for Strings'', op.13 (first broadcast, 1945) *

John Lanchbery John Arthur Lanchbery OBE (15 May 1923 – 27 February 2003) was an English-Australian composer and conductor, famous for his ballet arrangements. He served as the Principal Conductor of the Royal Ballet from 1959 to 1972, Principal Conductor ...

. ''Sinfonietta for strings'' (first performance, 1947) * Bohuslav Martinů. ''Romanian Partita' (premiere of string orchestra version, 1940) *

. Concerto for harpsichord and double string orchestra (first performance, 1959) *

Cyril Scott Cyril Meir Scott (27 September 1879 – 31 December 1970) was an English composer, writer, poet, and occultist. He created around four hundred musical compositions including piano, violin, cello concertos, symphonies, and operas. He also wrot ...

. ''Irish Serenade'' (first performance, 1951)

Education and early career

Orchestras

Personal life and legacy

Selected premiere performances

References

Further reading