Dame Thea King DBE FRCM FGSM (26 December 1925 – 26 June 2007) was a British

clarinettist This article lists notable musicians who have played the clarinet. Classical clarinetists * Laver Bariu * Ernest Ačkun * Luís Afonso * Cristiano Alves * Michel Arrignon * Dimitri Ashkenazy * Kinan Azmeh * Alexander Bader * Carl Baermann ...

Biography

Early life

Thea King was born in

Hitchin Hitchin () is a market town and unparished area in the North Hertfordshire Districts of England, district in Hertfordshire, England, with an estimated population of 35,842. History Hitchin is first noted as the central place of the Hicce peopl ...

Hertfordshire Hertfordshire ( or ; often abbreviated Herts) is one of the home counties in southern England. It borders Bedfordshire and Cambridgeshire to the north, Essex to the east, Greater London to the south, and Buckinghamshire to the west. For govern ...

, the daughter of Henry Walter Mayer King, the manager of his family engineering business, and Dorothea (née Hass).''Daily Telegraph'' Obituary
accessed 30 June 2007 She was educated at Bedford High School and won a scholarship to the

Royal College of Music The Royal College of Music is a music school, conservatoire established by royal charter in 1882, located in South Kensington, London, UK. It offers training from the Undergraduate education, undergraduate to the Doctorate, doctoral level in a ...

where she studied the

piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboa ...

with Arthur Alexander and the

clarinet The clarinet is a musical instrument in the woodwind family. The instrument has a nearly cylindrical bore and a flared bell, and uses a single reed to produce sound. Clarinets comprise a family of instruments of differing sizes and pitches ...

with

Frederick Thurston Frederick John Thurston (21 September 1901 – 12 December 1953) was an English clarinettist. Career From the age of 7 he was taught by his father and he won an open scholarship to the Royal College of Music, becoming a pupil of Charles Drap ...

. In January 1953 she married Frederick Thurston but he died from

lung cancer Lung cancer, also known as lung carcinoma (since about 98–99% of all lung cancers are carcinomas), is a malignant lung tumor characterized by uncontrolled cell growth in tissue (biology), tissues of the lung. Lung carcinomas derive from tran ...

in December of the same year. She never remarried.

Career

She worked as soloist, chamber musician and as a teacher but was probably associated most closely with the

English Chamber Orchestra The English Chamber Orchestra (ECO) is a British chamber orchestra based in London. The full orchestra regularly plays concerts at Cadogan Hall, and their ensemble performs at Wigmore Hall. The orchestra regularly tours in the UK and internationall ...

as principal clarinet from 1964 to 1999. She also worked with the

London Mozart Players London Mozart Players (LMP) are a British chamber orchestra founded in 1949. LMP are the longest-established chamber orchestra in the United Kingdom. Since 1989, the orchestra has been Resident Orchestra at Fairfield Halls, Croydon. History B ...

, succeeding

Gervase de Peyer Gervase Alan de Peyer (11 April 1926 – 4 February 2017) was an English clarinettist and conductor. Professional career Gervase Alan de Peyer was born in London, the eldest of three children of Everard Esmé Vivian de Peyer, and his wife, Edith ...

as principal clarinettist, the Sadler's Wells Opera Orchestra, the

Melos Ensemble The Melos Ensemble is a group of musicians who started in 1950 in London to play chamber music in mixed instrumentation of string instruments, wind instruments and others. Benjamin Britten composed the chamber music for his '' War Requiem'' for th ...

and the Allegri String Quartet. She was a founder member in 1953 of the Portia Wind Ensemble, an all female group. Thea King made a special study of lesser known works of the 18th and 19th centuries, especially those of Crusell. She commissioned

Elizabeth Maconchy Dame Elizabeth Violet Maconchy LeFanu (; 19 March 1907 – 11 November 1994) was an Irish-English composer. She is considered to be one of the finest composers Great Britain and Ireland have produced. Biography Elizabeth Violet Maconchy was b ...

's ''Fantasia'' and

Howard Blake Howard David Blake (born 28 October 1938) is an English composer, conductor, and pianist whose career has spanned more than 50 years and produced more than 650 works. Blake's most successful work is his soundtrack for Channel 4’s 1982 film ' ...

's ''Clarinet Concerto''. Compositions dedicated to her by British composers include

Benjamin Frankel Benjamin Frankel (31 January 190612 February 1973) was a British composer. His best known pieces include a cycle of five string quartets, eight symphonies, and concertos for violin and viola. He was also notable for writing over 100 film scores ...

's ''Clarinet Quintet'' (which she recorded in 1991, helping revive interest in the then neglected composer)Kennaway, E.D.
"Benjamin Frankel: A Forgotten Legacy"
in ''Musical Times'', February 1992, p 69-70 and

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 ''Mini Concerto''. From 1961 to 1987, she was Professor of Clarinet at the Royal College of Music and she was a professor at the

Guildhall School of Music and Drama The Guildhall School of Music and Drama is a conservatoire and drama school located in the City of London, United Kingdom. Established in 1880, the school offers undergraduate and postgraduate training in all aspects of classical music and jazz ...

from 1988 until her death. She was a Fellow of both institutions. Thea King was made an OBE in 1985 and was appointed a DBE in 2001.

References

External links

Hyperion Records
{{DEFAULTSORT:King, Thea 1925 births 2007 deaths Academics of the Royal College of Music Alumni of the Royal College of Music British classical clarinetists British clarinetists Dames Commander of the Order of the British Empire Musicians awarded knighthoods People from Hitchin Musicians from London Honorary Members of the Royal Academy of Music People educated at Bedford High School, Bedfordshire Musicians from Hertfordshire 20th-century classical musicians 20th-century English musicians