Peggy Glanville-Hicks
Peggy Glanville-Hicks (1912–1990) was an Australian composer, born in Melbourne, whose career carried her through London, New York and Greece. She wrote operas, chamber music, song cycles and a concise Sonata for Harp that remains widely played.
Her music favours clear melody and rhythm over dense harmony. Song cycles such as Profiles from China, the Housman set Mimic Heaven, Wallace Stevens’s Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird and the orchestral Letters from Morocco sit beside chamber scores including the neo-classical Concertino da camera.
The harp sonata, with its Saeta, Pastorale and Rondo, is a staple of Australian recital programmes. Operas including The Transposed Heads and Nausicaa grew from her years abroad and her long interest in myth and non-Western melody.
She came home in the 1970s. Her will left her Paddington house as a residency for young Australian composers.
Peggy Glanville-Hicks is featured on the following titles
Peggy Glanville-Hicks: The Songs
World premiere recordings of songs by Australian composer Peggy Glanville-Hicks, including the cycle Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird, sung by tenor Gerald English.
Compositions by Peggy Glanville-Hicks also appear on
Red Earth
A world-premiere recording of important Australian works for instrumental ensemble. Performers and repertoire were hand-selected for the project, which was funded by the Australia Council.
An Australian Collection
Nineteen tracks drawn from the Tall Poppies catalogue, chosen to show the range and depth of Australian composition and performance across the label’s first decade.
Awakening
Marshall McGuire is a formidable asset to Australia’s contemporary music scene, and the only harpist specialising in both baroque harp and all forms of modern music. This Tall Poppies disc remains a catalogue best-seller.